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THE    BLOTTING    BOOK 


BY 

E. 

F.  BENSON 

Sheaves 

The  Princess  Sophia 

Dodo 

The  Luck  of  the  Vails 

Six  Common  Things 

Scarlet  and  Hyssop 

Rubicon 

Book  of  the  Months 

Judgment  Books 

The  Relentless  City 

Limitations 

The  Challoners 

The  Babe,  B.  A. 

An  Act  in  Backwater 

Vintage 

The  Image  in  the  Sand 

The  Capsina 

The  Angel  of  Pain 

Mammon  and  Co. 

Aunt  Jeannie,  a  Play 

The 

Blotting  Book 


By 
E.  F.  BENSON 


New    York 

Doubleday,   Page  &  Company 

1908 


COPYRISHT,    1907,   BY 
AINSLEE    MAGAZINE   COMPANY,    NEW    YORK 


ALL  RIGHTS   RESERVED,    INCLUDING   THAT   OP    TRANSLATION 
INTO   FOREIGN    LANGUAGES,  INCLUDING   THE  SCANDINAVIAN 


COPYRIGHT,    1908,     BY 

DOUBLEDAY,    PAGE    &    COMPANY 

PUBLISHED,   AUGUST,    I908 


THE    BLOTTING    BOOK 


The   Blotting  Book 

CHAPTER  I 

MRS.  ASSHETON'S  house  in  Sus- 
sex Square,  Brighton,  was  ap- 
pointed with  that  finish  of  smooth 
statehness  which  robs  stateUness  of 
its  formahty,  and  conceals  the  amount 
of  trouble  and  personal  attention 
which  has,  originally  in  any  case, 
been  spent  on  the  production  of  the 
smoothness.  Everything  moved  with 
the  regularity  of  the  solar  system,  and, 
superior  to  that  wild  rush  of  heavy 
bodies  through  infinite  ether,  there  was 
never  the  slightest  fear  of  comets  streak- 
ing their  unconjectured  way  across  the 
sky,  or  meteorites  falling  on  unsuspi- 
cious picnicers.       In  Mrs.   Assheton's 

3 


4         THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

house,  supreme  over  climatic  conditions, 
nobody  ever  felt  that  rooms  were  either 
too  hot  or  too  cold,  a  pleasantly  fresh 
yet  comfortably  warm  atmosphere  per- 
vaded the  place,  meals  were  always 
punctual  and  her  admirable  Scotch 
cook  never  served  up  a  dish  which, 
whether  plain  or  ornate,  was  not,  in  its 
way,  perfectly  prepared.  A  couple 
of  deft  and  noiseless  parlour-maids 
attended  to  and  anticipated  the  wants 
of  her  guests,  from  the  moment  they 
entered  her  hospitable  doors  till  when, 
on  their  leaving  them,  their  coats  were 
held  for  them  in  the  most  convenient 
possible  manner  for  the  easy  insertion 
of  the  human  arm,  and  the  tails  of 
their  dinner-coats  cunningly  and  un- 
erringly tweaked  from  behind.  In 
every  way  in  fact  the  house  was  an 
example  of  perfect  comfort;  the  softest 
carpets  overlaid  the  floors,  or,  where 
the  polished  wood  was  left  bare,  the 
parquetry    shone    with    a    moonlike 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK         5 

radiance;  the  newest  and  most  enter- 
taining books  (ready  cut)  stood  on 
the  well-ordered  shelves  in  the  sitting- 
room  to  beguile  the  leisure  of  the 
studiously  minded;  the  billiard  table 
was  always  speckless  of  dust,  no  tip 
was  ever  missing  from  any  cue,  and 
the  cigarette  boxes  and  match-stands 
were  always  kept  replenished.  In 
the  dining-room  the  silver  was  resplen- 
dent, until  the  moment  when  before 
dessert  the  cloth  was  withdrawn, 
and  showed  a  rosewood  table  that 
might  have  served  for  a  mirror  to 
Narcissus. 

Mrs.  Assheton,  until  her  only  sur- 
viving son  Morris  had  come  to  live 
with  her  some  three  months  ago  on 
the  completion  of  his  four  years 
at  Cambridge,  had  been  alone,  but 
even  when  she  was  alone  this  cere- 
mony of  drawing  the  cloth  and 
putting  on  the  dessert  and  wine  had 
never  been  omitted,  though  since  she 


6         THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

never  took  either,  it  might  seem  to 
be  a  wasted  piece  of  routine  on  the 
part  of  the  two  noiseless  parlour- 
maids. But  she  did  not  in  the  least 
consider  it  so,  for  just  as  she  always 
dressed  for  dinner  herself  with  the 
same  care  and  finish,  whether  she  was 
going  to  dine  alone  or  whether,  as  to- 
night, a  guest  or  two  was  dining 
with  her,  as  an  offering,  so  to  speak, 
on  the  altar  of  her  own  self-respect, 
so  also  she  required  self-respect  and 
the  formality  that  indicated  it  on 
the  part  of  those  who  ministered  at 
her  table,  and  enjoyed  such  excel- 
lent wages.  This  pretty  old-fashioned 
custom  had  always  been  the  rule 
in  her  own  home,  and  her  husband 
had  always  had  it  practised  during 
his  life.  And  since  then  —  his  death 
had  occurred  some  twenty  years  ago  — 
nothing  that  she  knew  of  had  hap- 
pened to  make  it  less  proper  or 
desirable.     Kind  of  heart  and  warm 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK         7 

of  soul  though  she  was,  she  saw  no 
reason  for  letting  these  excellent  quali- 
ties cover  any  slackness  or  breach  of 
observance  in  the  social  form  of  life 
to  which  she  had  been  accustomed. 
There  was  no  cause,  because  one  was 
kind  and  wise,  to  eat  with  badly 
cleaned  silver,  unless  the  parlour-maid 
whose  office  it  was  to  clean  it  was 
unwell.  In  such  a  case,  if  the  extra 
work  entailed  by  her  illness  would 
throw  too  much  on  the  shoulders 
of  the  other  servants,  Mrs.  Assheton 
would  willingly  clean  the  silver  her- 
self, rather  than  that  it  should  appear 
dull  and  tarnished.  Her  formalism, 
such  as  it  was,  was  perfectly  simple 
and  sincere.  She  would,  without  any 
very  poignant  regret  or  sense  of  martyr- 
dom, had  her  very  comfortable  income 
been  cut  down  to  a  tenth  of  what 
it  was,  have  gone  to  live  in  a  four- 
roomed  cottage  with  one  servant.  But 
she  would  have  left  that  four-roomed 


8         THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

cottage  at  once  for  even  humbler 
surroundings  had  she  found  that  her 
straitened  circumstances  did  not 
permit  her  to  keep  it  as  speckless  and 
soignee  as  was  her  present  house  in 
Sussex  Square. 

This  achievement  of  having  Hved 
for  nearly  sixty  years  so  decorously 
may  perhaps  be  a  somewhat  finer 
performance  than  it  sounds,  but  Mrs. 
Assheton  brought  as  her  contribution 
to  life  in  general  a  far  finer  offering 
than  that,  for  though  she  did  not 
propose  to  change  her  ways  and  manner 
of  life  herself,  she  was  notoriously 
sympathetic  with  the  changed  life  of 
the  younger  generation,  and  in  conse- 
quence had  the  confidence  of  young 
folk  generally.  At  this  moment  she 
was  enjoying  the  fruits  of  her  liberal 
attitude  in  the  volubility  of  her  son 
Morris,  who  sat  at  the  end  of  the 
table  opposite  to  her.  His  volubility 
was   at    present    concerned    with    his 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK  g 

motor-car,  in  which  he  had  arrived 
that  afternoon. 

"Darhng  mother,"  he  was  saying, 
' '  I  really  was  frightened  as  to  whether 
you  would  mind.  I  couldn't  help 
remembering  how  you  received  Mr. 
Taynton's  proposal  that  you  should  go 
for  a  drive  in  his  car.  Don't  you 
remember,  Mr.  Taynton?  Mother's 
nose  did  go  in  the  air.  It's  no  use 
denying  it.  So  I  thought,  perhaps, 
that  she  would  n  't  like  my  having  one. 
But  I  wanted  it  so  dreadfully,  and  so 
I  bought  it  without  telling  her,  and 
drove  down  in  it  to-day,  which  is  my 
birthday,  so  that  she  could  n't  be  too 
severe." 

Mr.  Taynton,  while  Morris  was  speak- 
ing, had  picked  up  the  nutcrackers  the 
boy  had  been  using,  and  was  gravely 
exploding  the  shells  of  the  nuts  he  had 
helped  himself  to.  So  Morris  cracked 
the  next  one  with  a  loud  bang  between 
his  white  even  teeth. 


lo       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

"Dear  Morris,"  said  his  mother, 
"how  foohsh  of  you.  Give  Mr.  Mor- 
ris another  nutcracker,"  she  added 
to  the  parlour-maid. 

"What's  foohsh?"  asked  he,  crack- 
ing   another. 

"Oh  Morris,  your  teeth,"  she  said. 
"Do  wait  a  moment.  Yes,  that  's 
right.  And  how  can  you  say  that 
my  nose  went  in  the  air?  I  'm  sure 
Mr.  Taynton  will  agree  with  me  that 
that  is  really  libellous.  And  as  for  your 
being  afraid  to  tell  me  you  had  bought 
a  motor-car  yourself,  why,  that  is  sillier 
than  cracking  nuts  with  your  teeth." 

Mr.  Taynton  laughed  a  comfortable 
middle-aged    laugh. 

"Don't  put  the  responsibility  on 
me,  Mrs.  Assheton,"  he  said.  "As 
long  as  Morris's  bank  does  n  't  tell  us 
that  his  account  is  overdrawn,  he 
can  do  what  he  pleases.  But  if  we 
are  told  that,  then  down  comes  the 
cartloads    of    bricks." 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK        ii 

"Oh,  you  are  a  brick  all  right,  Mr. 
Taynton, ' '  said  the  boy.  '  *  I  could 
stand    a    cartload    of    you." 

Mr.  Taynton,  like  his  laugh,  was 
comfortable  and  middle-aged.  Solic- 
itors are  supposed  to  be  sharp-faced 
and  fox-like,  but  his  face  was  well- 
furnished  and  comely,  and  his  rather 
bald  head  beamed  with  benevolence 
and   dinner. 

"My  dear  boy,"  he  said,  "and  it 
is  your  birthday  —  I  cannot  honour 
either  you  or  this  wonderful  port 
more  properly  than  by  drinking  your 
health    in   it." 

He  began  and  finished  his  glass 
to  the  health  he  had  so  neatly  pro- 
posed, and  Morris  laughed. 

"Thank  you  very  much,"  he  said. 
"Mother,  do  send  the  port  round. 
What    an    inhospitable    woman!" 

Mrs.  Assheton  rose. 

* '  I  will  leave  you  to  be  more  hos- 
pitable than  me,  then,  dear,"  she  said. 


12        THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

"Shall  we  go,  Madge?  Indeed,  I  am 
afraid  you  must,  if  you  are  to  catch 
the  train  to  Falmer." 

Madge  Templeton  got  up  with  her 
hostess,  and  the  two  men  rose  too. 
She  had  been  sitting  next  Morris, 
and  the  boy  looked  at  her  eagerly. 

"It's  too  bad,  your  having  to  go," 
he  said.  "But  do  you  think  I  may 
come  over  to-morrow,  in  the  after- 
noon some  time,  and  see  you  and 
Lady  Templeton?" 

Madge  paused  a  moment. 

"I  am  so  sorry,"  she  said,  "but 
we  shall  be  away  all  day.  We  shan't 
be  back  till  quite  late." 

"Oh,  what  a  bore,"  said  he,  "and 
I  leave  again  on  Friday.  Do  let  me 
come  and  see  you  off  then." 

But   Mrs.    Assheton   interposed. 

"No,  dear,"  she  said,  "I  am  going 
to  have  five  minutes '  talk  with  Madge 
before  she  goes  and  we  don't  want  you. 
Look  after  Mr.  Taynton.     I  know  he 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       13 

wants  to  talk  to  you  and  I  want  to 
talk  to  Madge." 

Mr.  Taynton,  when  the  door  had 
closed  behind  the  ladies,  sat  down 
again  with  a  rather  obvious  air  of 
proposing  to  enjoy  himself.  It  was 
quite  true  that  he  had  a  few  pleasant 
things  to  say  to  Morris,  it  is  also  true 
that  he  immensely  appreciated  the 
wonderful  port  which  glowed,  ruby- 
like, in  the  nearly  full  decanter  that 
lay  to  his  hand.  And,  above  all, 
he,  with  his  busy  life,  occupied  for  the 
most  part  in  innumerable  small  affairs, 
revelled  in  the  sense  of  leisure  and 
serene  smoothness  which  permeated 
Mrs.  Assheton's  house.  He  was  still 
a  year  or  two  short  of  sixty,  and  but 
for  his  very  bald  and  shining  head 
would  have  seemed  younger,  so  fresh 
was  he  in  complexion,  so  active, 
despite  a  certain  reassuring  corpu- 
lency, was  he  in  his  movements.     But 


14       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

when  he  dined  quietly  Hke  this,  at 
Mrs.  Assheton's,  he  would  willing- 
ly have  sacrificed  the  next  five  years 
of  his  life  if  he  could  have  been  as- 
sured on  really  reliable  authority  — 
the  authority  for  instance  of  the 
Recording  Angel — that  in  five  years 
time  he  would  be  able  to  sit  quiet 
and  not  work  any  more.  He  wanted 
very  much  to  be  able  to  take  a  pas- 
sive instead  of  an  active  interest  in 
life,  and  this  a  few  hundreds  of  pounds 
a  year  in  addition  to  his  savings 
would  enable  him  to  do.  He  saw, 
in  fact,  the  goal  arrived  at  which  he 
would  be  able  to  sit  still  and  wait 
with  serenity  and  calmness  for  the 
event  which  would  certainly  relieve 
him  of  all  further  material  anxieties. 
His  very  active  life,  the  activities  of 
which  were  so  largely  benevolent,  had 
at  the  expiration  of  fifty-eight  years 
a  little  tired  him.  He  coveted  the 
leisure  which  was  so  nearly  his. 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       15 

Morris  lit  a  cigarette  for  himself, 
having  previously  passed  the  wine  to 
Mr.  Taynton. 

"I  hate  port,"  he  said,  "but  my 
mother  tells  me  this  is  all  right.  It 
was  laid  down  the  year  I  was  bom  by 
the  way.  You  don't  mind  my  smoking 
do  you?" 

This,  to  tell  the  truth,  seemed  almost 
sacrilegious  to  Mr.  Taynton,  for  the 
idea  that  tobacco,  especially  the  frivol- 
ous cigarette,  should  bum  in  a  room 
where  such  port  was  being  drunk  was 
sheer  crime  against  human  and  divine 
laws.  But  he  could  scarcely  indicate 
to  his  host  that  he  should  not  smoke 
in  his  own  dining-room. 

"No,  my  dear  Morris,"  he  said, 
"but  really  you  almost  shock  me, 
when  you  prefer  tobacco  to  this 
nectar,  I  assure  you  nectar.  And 
the  car,  now,  tell  me  more  about  the 
car." 

Morris  laughed. 


i6       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

"I  'm  so  deeply  thankful  I  haven't 
overdrawn,"  he  said.  "Oh,  the  car's 
a  clipper.  We  came  down  from  Hay- 
wards  Heath  the  most  gorgeous  pace. 
I  saw  one  policeman  trying  to  take 
my  number,  but  we  raised  such  a 
dust,  I  don't  think  he  can  have  been 
able  to  see  it.  It 's  such  rot  only 
going  twenty  miles  an  hour  with  a 
clear  straight  road  ahead." 

Mr.  Taynton  sighed,  gently  and  not 
unhappily. 

"Yes,  yes,  my  dear  boy,  I  so 
sympathise  with  you,"  he  said. 
"Speed  and  violence  is  the  proper 
attitude  of  youth,  just  as  strength 
with  a  more  measured  pace  is  the 
proper  gait  for  older  folk.  And  that, 
I  fancy  is  just  what  Mrs.  Assheton 
felt.  She  would  feel  it  to  be  as  un- 
natural in  you  to  care  to  drive  with 
her  in  her  very  comfortable  victoria 
as  she  would  feel  it  to  be  unnatural 
in  herself  to  wish  to  go  in  your  lightning 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK        17 

speed  motor.     And  that  reminds  me. 
As  your  trustee ' ' 

Coffee  was  brought  in  at  this 
moment,  carried,  not  by  one  of  the 
discreet  parlour-maids,  but  by  a  young 
man-servant.  Mr.  Taynton,  with  the 
port  still  by  him,  refused  it,  but  looked 
rather  curiously  at  the  servant. 
Morris  however  mixed  himself  a  cup 
in  which  cream,  sugar,  and  coffee  were 
about  equally  mingled. 

"A  new  servant  of  your  mother's?" 
he  asked,  when  the  man  had  left  the 
room. 

"Oh  no.  It's  my  man,  Martin. 
Awfully  handy  chap.  Cleans  silver, 
boots  and  the  motor.  Drives  it,  too, 
when  I  '11  let  him,  which  is  n't  very 
often.  Chauffeurs  are  such  rotters, 
aren't  they?  Regular  chauffeurs  I 
mean.  They  always  make  out  that 
something  is  wrong  with  the  car,  just 
as  dentists  always  find  some  hole  in 
your  teeth,  if  you  go  to  them." 


i8       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

Mr.  Taynton  did  not  reply  to  these 
critical  generalities  but  went  back  to 
what  he  had  been  saying  when  the 
entry  of  coffee  interrupted  him. 

"As  your  mother  said,"  he  remarked, 
"I  wanted  to  have  a  few  words  with 
you.  You  are  twenty-two,  are  you 
not,  to-day?  Well,  when  I  was  young 
we  considered  anyone  of  twenty-two  a 
boy  still,  but  now  I  think  young 
fellows  grow  up  more  quickly,  and  at 
twenty-two,  you  are  a  man  nowadays, 
and  I  think  it  is  time  for  you,  since 
my  trusteeship  for  you  may  end 
any  day  now,  to  take  a  rather  more 
active  interest  in  the  state  of  your 
finances  than  you  have  hitherto  done. 
I  want  you  in  fact,  my  dear  fellow, 
to  listen  to  me  for  five  minutes  while 
I  state  your  position  to  you." 

Morris  indicated  the  port  again,  and 
Mr.  Taynton  refilled  his  glass. 

"  I  have  had  twenty  years  of  steward- 
ship   for    you,"    he    went    on,    "and 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       19 

before  my  stewardship  comes  to  an 
end,  which  it  will  do  anyhow  in  three 
years  from  now,  and  may  come  to  an 
end  any  day ' ' 

"Why,  how  is  that?"  asked  Morris. 
.  "If  you  marry,  my  dear  boy.  By 
the  terms  of  your  father's  will,  your 
marriage,  provided  it  takes  place  with 
your  mother's  consent,  and  after  your 
twenty-second  birthday,  puts  you  in 
complete  control  and  possession  of 
your  fortune.  Otherwise,  as  of  course 
you  know,  you  come  of  age,  legally 
speaking,  on  your  twenty-fifth  birth- 
day." 

Morris  lit  another  cigarette  rather 
impatiently. 

"Yes,  I  knew  I  was  a  minor  till  I 
was  twenty-five,"  he  said,  "and  I 
suppose  I  have  known  that  if  I 
married  after  the  age  of  twenty- two, 
I  became  a  major,  or  whatever  you 
call  it.  But  what  then?  Do  let  us 
go   and   play  billiards,    I  '11  give   you 


20       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

twenty-five  in  a  hundred,  because 
I  've  been  playing  a  lot  lately,  and 
I  '11  bet  half  a  crown." 

Mr.  Taynton's  fist  gently  tapped 
the  table. 

"Done,"  he  said,  "and  we  will  play 
in  five  minutes.  But  I  have  some- 
thing to  say  to  you  first.  Your 
mother,  as  you  know,  enjoys  the 
income  of  the  bulk  of  your  father's 
property  for  her  lifetime.  Outside 
that,  he  left  this  much  smaller  capital 
of  which,  as  also  of  her  money,  my 
partner  and  I  are  trustees.  The  sum 
he  left  you  was  thirty  thousand  pounds. 
It  is  now  rather  over  forty  thousand 
pounds,  since  we  have  changed  the 
investments  from  time  to  time,  and 
always,  I  am  glad  to  say,  with  satis- 
factory results.  The  value  of  her 
property  has  gone  up  also  in  a  corre- 
sponding degree.  That,  however,  does 
not  concern  you.  But  since  you  are 
now  twenty-two,   and  your  marriage 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       21 

would  put  the  whole  of  this  smaller 
sum  into  your  hands,  would  it  not  be 
well  for  you  to  look  through  our  books, 
to  see  for  yourself  the  account  we 
render  of  our  stewardship?" 

Morris  laughed. 

"But  for  what  reason?"  he  asked. 
"You  tell  me  that  my  portion  has 
increased  in  value  by  ten  thousand 
pounds.  I  am  delighted  to  hear  it. 
And  I  thank  you  very  much.  And 
as    for  " 

He  broke  off  short,  and  Mr.  Taynton 
let  a  perceptible  pause  follow  before 
he  interrupted. 

"As  for  the  possibility  of  your 
m  arry ing  ? "    he    suggested . 

Morris  gave  him  a  quick,  eager, 
glance. 

"Yes,  I  think  there  is  that  pos- 
sibility," he  said.  "I  hope  —  I  hope 
it  is  not  far  distant." 

"My  dear  boy "  said  the  lawyer. 

"Ah,  not  a  word.     I  don't  know " 


22       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

Morris  pushed  his  chair  back  quick- 
ly, and  stood  up — his  tall  slim  figure 
outlined  against  the  sober  red  of 
the  dining-room  wall.  A  plume  of 
black  hair  had  escaped  from  his  well- 
brushed  head  and  hung  over  his  fore- 
head, and  his  sun- tanned  vivid  face 
looked  extraordinarily  handsome.  His 
mother's  clear-cut  energetic  features 
were  there,  with  the  glow  and  buoy- 
ancy of  youth  kindling  them.  Violent 
vitality  was  his  also;  his  was  the  hot 
blood  that  could  do  any  deed  when 
the  life-instinct  commanded  it.  He 
looked  like  one  of  those  who  could  give 
their  body  to  be  burned  in  the  pursuit 
of  an  idea,  or  could  as  easily  steal,  or 
kill,  provided  only  the  deed  was 
vitally  done  in  the  heat  of  his 
blood.  Violence  was  clearly  his  mode 
of  life:  the  motor  had  to  go  sixty 
miles  an  hour;  he  might  be  one  of 
those  who  bathed  in  the  Serpentine 
in  mid-winter;  he  would  clearly  dance 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       23 

all  night,  and  ride  all  day,  and 
go  on  till  he  dropped  in  the  pursuit 
of  what  he  cared  for.  Mr.  Taynton, 
looking  at  him  as  he  stood  smiling 
there,  in  his  splendid  health  and 
vigour  felt  all  this.  He  felt,  too, 
that  if  Morris  intended  to  be  mar- 
ried to-morrow  morning,  matrimony 
would  probably  take  place. 

But  Morris's  pause,  after  he  pushed 
his  chair  back  and  stood  up,  was 
only  momentary. 

"Good  God,  yes;  I'm  in  love," 
he  said.  "And  she  probably  thinks 
me  a  stupid  barbarian,  who  likes 
only  to  drive  golfballs  and  motor- 
cars. She  —  oh,  it  's  hopeless.  She 
would  have  let  me  come  over  to  see 
them  to-morrow  otherwise." 

He    paused    again. 

"And  now  I  've  given  the  whole 
show    away,"    he    said. 

Mr.  Taynton  made  a  comfortable 
sort    of    noise.     It    was    compounded 


24      THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

of  laughter,  sympathy,  and  com- 
prehension. 

"You  gave  it  away  long  ago,  my 
dear  Morris,"   he  said. 

"You  had  guessed?"  asked  Morris, 
sitting  down  again  with  the  same 
quickness  and  violence  of  movement, 
and  putting  both  his  elbows  on  the 
table. 

"No,  my  dear  boy,  you  had  told 
me,  as  you  have  told  everybody, 
without  mentioning  it.  And  I  most 
heartily  congratulate  you.  I  never 
saw  a  more  delightful  girl.  Pro- 
fessionally also,  I  feel  bound  to  add 
that  it  seems  to  me  a  most  proper 
alliance  —  heirs  should  always  marry 
heiresses.  It" — Mr.  Taynton  drank 
off  the  rest  of  his  port — "it  keeps 
properties    together." 

Hot  blood  again  dictated  to  Morris: 
it  seemed  dreadful  to  him  that  any 
thought  of  money  or  of  property 
could     be     mentioned    in    the    same 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       25 

breath  as  that  which  he  longed  for. 
He  rose  again  as  abruptly  and  vio- 
lently as  he  had  sat  down. 

"Well,  let  's  play  billiards,"  he  said. 
"I  —  I  don't  think  you  understand 
a  bit.     You  can't,   in  fact." 

Mr.  Taynton  stroked  the  tablecloth 
for  a  moment  with  a  plump  white 
forefinger. 

"Crabbed  age  and  youth,"  he  re- 
marked. "But  crabbed  age  makes 
an  appeal  to  youth,  if  youth  will 
kindly  call  to  mind  what  crabbed  age 
referred  to  some  five  minutes  ago. 
In  other  words,  will  you,  or  will  you  not, 
Morris,  spend  a  very  dry  three  hours 
at  my  office,  looking  into  the  ac- 
count of  my  stewardship?  There 
was  thirty  thousand  pounds,  and  there 
now  is  —  or  should  we  say  'are'  — 
forty.  It  will  take  you  not  less  than 
two  hours,  and  not  more  than  three. 
But  since  my  stewardship  may  come 
to  an  end,  as  I  said,  any  day,  I  should, 


26       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

not  for  my  own  sake,  but  for  yours, 
wish  you  to  see  what  we  have  done 
for  you,  and  —  I  own  this  would  be  a 
certain  private  gratification  to  me  — 
to  learn  that  you  thought  that  the 
trust  your  dear  father  reposed  in  us 
was   not   misplaced." 

There  was  something  about  these 
simple  words  which  touched  Morris. 
For  the  moment  he  became  almost 
businesslike.  Mr.  Ta3mton  had  been, 
as  he  knew,  a  friend  of  his  father's, 
and,  as  he  had  said,  he  had  been 
steward  of  his  own  affairs  for  twenty 
years.  But  that  reflection  banished 
the  businesslike  view. 

"Oh,  but  two  hours  is  a  fearful 
time,"  he  said.  "You  have  told 
me  the  facts,  and  they  entirely  satisfy 
me.  And  I  want  to  be  out  all  day 
to-morrow,  as  I  am  only  here  till  the 
day  after.  But  I  shall  be  down  again 
next  week.  Let  us  go  into  it  all 
then.     Not  that  there  is  the  slightest 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       27 

use  in  going  into  anything.  And 
when,  Mr.  Taynton,  I  become  steward 
of  my  own  affairs,  you  may  be  quite 
certain  that  I  shall  beg  you  to  con- 
tinue looking  after  them.  Why  you 
gained  me  ten  thousand  pounds  in 
these  twenty  years  —  I  wonder  what 
there  would  have  been  to  my  credit 
now  if  I  had  looked  after  things 
myself.  But  since  we  are  on  the  sub- 
ject I  should  like  just  this  once  to 
assure  you  of  my  great  gratitude  to 
you,  for  all  you  have  done.  And  I 
ask  you,  if  you  will,  to  look  after  my 
affairs  in  the  future  with  the  same 
completeness  as  you  have  always  done. 
My  father's  will  does  not  prevent 
that,   does   it?" 

Mr.  Taynton  looked  at  the  young 
fellow  with  affection. 

"Dear  Morris,"  he  said  gaily,  "we 
lawyers  and  solicitors  are  always  sup- 
posed to  be  sharks,  but  personally  I 
am   not   such  a   shark  as  that.     Are 


28       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

you  aware  that  I  am  paid  £200  a  year 
for  my  stewardship,  which  you  are 
entitled  to  assume  for  yourself  on 
your  marriage,  though  of  course  its 
continuance  in  my  hands  is  not  for- 
bidden in  your  father's  will?  You 
are  quite  competent  to  look  after 
yotir  affairs  yourself;  it  is  ridiculous 
for  you  to  continue  to  pay  me  this 
sum.  But  I  thank  you  from  the  bottom 
of  my  heart  for  your  confidence  in  me." 

A  very  close  observer  might  have 
seen  that  behind  Mr.  Taynton's  kind 
gay  eyes  there  was  sitting  a  person- 
ality, so  to  speak,  that,  as  his  mouth 
framed  these  words,  was  watching 
Morris  rather  narrowly  and  anxiously. 
But  the  moment  Morris  spoke  this 
silent  secret  watcher  popped  back 
again  out  of  sight. 

"Well  then  I  ask  you  as  a  personal 
favour,"  said  he,  "to  continue  being 
my  steward.  Why,  it  's  good  business 
for  n:e,  is  n't  it?     In  twenty  years  you 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       29 

make  me  ten  thousand  pounds,  and 
I  only  pay  you  ;^2oo  a  year  for  it. 
Please  be  kind,  Mr.  Taynton,  and 
continue  making  me  rich.  Oh,  I  'm 
a  jolly  hard-headed  chap  really;  I 
know  that  it  is  to  my  advantage." 

Mr.  Taynton  considered  this  a 
moment,  playing  with  his  wine  glass. 
Then  he  looked  up  quickly. 

"Yes,  Morris,  I  will  with  pleasure 
do  as  you  ask  me,"  he  said. 

"Right  oh.  Thanks  awfully.  Do 
come  and  play  billiards." 

Morris  was  in  amazing  luck  that 
night,  and  if,  as  he  said,  he  had  been 
playing  a  lot  lately,  the  advantage 
of  his  practice  was  seen  chiefly  in  the 
hideous  certainty  of  his  flukes,  and 
the  game  (though  he  received  twenty- 
five)  left  Mr.  Taynton  half  a  crown  the 
poorer.  Then  the  winner  whirled  his 
guest  upstairs  again  to  talk  to  his 
mother  while  he  himself  went  round  to 


30       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

the  stables  to  assure  himself  of  the 
well-being  of  the  beloved  motor. 
Martin  had  already  valeted  it,  after 
its  run,  and  was  just  locking  up  when 
Morris  arrived. 

Morris  gave  his  orders  for  next  day 
after  a  quite  unnecessary  examination 
into  the  internal  economy  of  the 
beloved,  and  was  just  going  back  to 
the  house,  when  he  paused,  remember- 
ing something. 

"Oh  Martin,"  he  said,  "while  I  am 
here,  I  want  you  to  help  in  the  house, 
you  know  at  dinner  and  so  on,  just 
as  you  did  to-night.  And  when  there 
are  guests  of  mine  here  I  want  you 
to  look  after  them.  For  instance, 
when  Mr.  Taynton  goes  to-night  you 
will  be  there  to  give  him  his  hat  and 
coat.  You  '11  have  rather  a  lot  to  do, 
I  'm  afraid." 

Morris  finished  his  cigarette  and 
went  back  to  the  drawing-room  where 
Mr.  Taynton  was  already  engaged  in  the 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       31 

staid  excitements  of  backgammon  with 
his  mother.  That  game  over,  Morris 
took  his  place,  and  before  long  the 
lawyer  rose  to  go. 

*'Now  I  absolutely  refuse  to  let  you 
interrupt  your  game,"  he  said.  "I 
have  found  my  way  out  of  this  house 
often  enough,  I  should  think.  Good 
night,  Mrs.  Assheton.  Good  night 
Morris;  don't  break  your  neck  my 
dear  boy,  in  trying  to  break  records." 

Morris  hardly  attended  to  this,  for 
the  game  was  critical.  He  just  rang 
the  bell,  said  good  night,  and  had 
thrown  again  before  the  door  had 
closed  behind  Mr.  Taynton.  Below, 
in  answer  to  the  bell,  was  standing  his 
servant. 

Mr.  Taynton  looked  at  him  again 
with  some  attention,  and  then  glanced 
round  to  see  if  the  discreet  parlour- 
maids were  about. 

"So  you  are  called  Martin  now," 
he  observed  gently. 


32       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

"Yes,  sir." 

"I  recognised  you  at  once." 

There  was  a  short  pause. 

"Are  you  going  to  tell  Mr.  Morris, 
sir?"  he  asked. 

"That  I  had  to  dismiss  you  two 
years  ago  for  theft?"  said  Mr.  Taynton 
quietly.  "  No,  not  if  you  behave  your- 
self." 

Mr.  Taynton  looked  at  him  again 
kindly  and  sighed. 

"No,  let  bygones  be  bygones,"  he 
said.  "  You  will  find  your  secret  is 
safe  enough.  And,  Martin,  I  hope 
you  have  really  turned  over  a  new 
leaf,  and  are  living  honestly  now. 
That  is  so,  my  lad?  Thank  God; 
thank  God.  My  umbrella?  Thanks. 
Good  night.     No  cab:      I  will  walk." 


CHAPTER  II 

MR.  TAYNTON  lived  in  a  square, 
comfortable  house  in  Mont- 
pellier  Road,  and  thus,  when  he  left 
Mrs.  Assheton's  there  was  some  two 
miles  of  pavement  and  sea  front  be- 
tween him  and  home.  But  the  night 
was  of  wonderful  beauty,  a  night  of 
mid  June,  warm  enough  to  make  the 
most  cautious  secure  of  chill,  and  at 
the  same  time  just  made  crisp  with 
a  little  breeze  that  blew  or  rather 
whispered  landward  from  over  the 
full-tide  of  the  sleeping  sea.  High  up  in 
the  heavens  swung  a  glorious  moon, 
which  cast  its  path  of  white  enchanted 
light  over  the  ripples,  and  seemed  to 
draw  the  heart  even  as  it  drew  the 
eyes  heavenward.  Mr.  Taynton  cer- 
tainly, as  he  stepped  out  beneath  the 
23 


34       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

stars,  with  the  sea  lying  below  him, 
felt,  in  his  delicate  and  sensitive 
nature,  the  charm  of  the  hour,  and 
being  a  good  if  not  a  brisk  walker, 
he  determined  to  go  home  on  foot. 
And  he  stepped  westward  very  con- 
tentedly. 

The  evening,  it  would  appear,  had 
much  pleased  him  —  for  it  was  long 
before  his  smile  of  retrospective  pleas- 
ure faded  from  his  pleasant  mobile 
face.  Morris's  trust  and  confidence  in 
him  had  been  extraordinarily  pleasant 
to  him:  and  modest  and  unassuming 
as  he  was,  he  could  not  help  a  secret 
gratification  at  the  thought.  What 
a  handsome  fellow  Morris  was  too,  how 
gay,  how  attractive!  He  had  his 
father's  dark  colouring,  and  tall  figure, 
but  much  of  his  mother's  grace  and 
charm  had  gone  to  the  modelling  of 
that  thin  sensitive  mouth  and  the 
long  oval  of  his  face.  Yet  there  was 
more  of  the  father  there,  the  father's 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK         35 

intense,  almost  violent,  vitality  was 
somehow  more  characteristic  of  the 
essential  Morris  than  face  or  feature. 
What  a  happy  thing  it  was  too  — 
here  the  smile  of  pleasure  illuminated 
Mr.  Taynton's  face  again  —  that  the 
boy  whom  he  had  dismissed  two 
years  before  for  some  petty  pilfering 
in  his  own  house,  should  have  turned 
out  such  a  promising  lad  and  should 
have  found  his  way  to  so  pleasant  a 
berth  as  that  of  factotum  to  Morris. 
Kindly  and  charitable  all  through  and 
ever  eager  to  draw  out  the  good  in 
everybody  and  forgive  the  bad,  Mr. 
Taynton  had  often  occasion  to  deplore 
the  hardness  and  uncharity  of  a  world 
which  remembers  youthful  errors  and 
hangs  them,  like  a  mill-stone,  round 
the  neck  of  the  offender,  and  it  warmed 
his  heart  and  kindled  his  smile  to 
think  of  one  case  at  any  rate  where  a 
youthful  misdemeanour  was  lived 
down    and    forgotten.     At    the    time 


36       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

he  remembered  being  in  doubt  whether 
he  should  not  give  the  offender  up 
to  justice,  for  the  pilfering,  petty 
though  it  had  been,  had  been  some- 
what persistent,  but  he  had  taken  the 
more  merciful  course,  and  merely  dis- 
missed the  boy.  He  had  been  in 
two  minds  about  it  before,  wondering 
whether  it  would  not  be  better  to 
let  Martin  have  a  sharp  lesson,  but 
to-night  he  was  thankful  that  he  had 
not  done  so.  The  mercy  he  had 
shown  had  come  back  to  bless  him 
also;  he  felt  a  glow  of  thankfulness 
that  the  subject  of  his  clemency  had 
turned  out  so  well.  Punishment 
often  hardens  the  criminal,  was  one 
of  his  settled  convictions.  But  Mor- 
ris —  again  his  thoughts  went  back  to 
Morris,  who  was  already  standing  on 
the  verge  of  manhood,  on  the  verge, 
too,  he  made  no  doubt  of  married  life 
and  its  joys  and  responsibilities.  Mr. 
Taynton  was  himself  a  bachelor,  and 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK        37 

the  thought  gave  him  not  a  moment 
of  jealousy,  but  a  moment  of  void 
that  ached  a  httle  at  the  thought  of  the 
common  human  bHss  which  he  had 
himself  missed.  How  charming,  too, 
was  the  girl  Madge  Templeton,  whom 
he  had  met,  not  for  the  first  time,  that 
evening.  He  himself  had  guessed 
how  things  stood  between  the  two 
before  Morris  had  confided  in  him, 
and  it  pleased  him  that  his  intuition 
was  confirmed.  What  a  pity,  how- 
ever, that  the  two  were  not  going  to 
meet  next  day,  that  she  was  out  with 
her  mother  and  would  not  get  back 
till  late.  It  would  have  been  a  cool- 
ing thought  in  the  hot  office  hours 
of  to-morrow  to  picture  them  sitting 
together  in  the  garden  at  Falmer,  or 
under  one  of  the  cool  deep-foliaged 
oaks  in  the  park. 

Then  suddenly  his  face  changed, 
the  smile  faded,  but  came  back  next 
instant  and  broadened  with  a  laugh. 


38       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

And  the  man  who  laughs  when  he  is 
by  himself  may  certainly  be  supposed 
to  have  strong  cause  for  amusement. 
Mr.  Taynton  had  come  by  this  time 
to  the  West  Pier,  and  a  hundred  yards 
farther  would  bring  him  to  Montpel- 
lier  Road.  But  it  was  yet  early,  as 
he  saw  (so  bright  was  the  moon- 
light) when  he  consulted  his  watch, 
and  he  retraced  his  steps  some  fifty 
yards,  and  eventually  rang  at  the 
door  of  a  big  house  of  flats  facing 
the  sea,  where  his  partner,  who  for 
the  most  part,  looked  after  the  Lon- 
don branch  of  their  business,  had  his 
pied-a-terre.  For  the  firm  of  Taynton 
and  Mills  was  one  of  those  respect- 
able and  solid  businesses  that,  begin- 
ning in  the  country,  had  eventually 
been  extended  to  town,  and  so  far 
from  its  having  its  headquarters  in 
town  and  its  branch  in  Brighton, 
had  its  headquarters  here  and  its 
branch  in  the  metropolis.     Mr.   God- 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK        39 

frey  Mills,  so  he  learned  at  the  door 
had  dined  alone,  and  was  in,  and  with- 
out further  delay  Mr.  Taynton  was 
carried  aloft  in  the  gaudy  bird-cage 
of  the  lift,  feeling  sure  that  his  part- 
ner would  see  him. 

The  fiat  into  which  he  Was  ushered 
with  a  smile  of  welcome  from  the  man 
who  opened  the  door  was  furnished 
with  a  sort  of  gross  opulence  that  never 
failed  to  jar  on  Mr.  Taynton's  exquisite 
taste  and  cultivated  mind.  Pictures, 
chairs,  sofas,  the  patterns  of  the  carpet, 
and  the  heavy  gilding  of  the  cornices 
were  all  sensuous,  a  sort  of  frangipanni 
to  the  eye.  The  apparent  contrast, 
however,  between  these  things  and 
their  owner,  was  as  great  as  that 
between  Mr.  Taynton  and  his  partner, 
for  Mr.  Godfrey  Mills  was  a  thin,  spare, 
dark  little  man,  brisk  in  movement, 
with  a  look  in  his  eye  that  betokened  a 
watchfulness  and  vigilance  of  the  most 
alert  order.   But  useful  as  such  a  gift  un- 


40       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

doubtedly  is,  it  was  given  to  Mr.  Godfrey 
Mills  perhaps  a  shade  too  obviously. 
It  would  be  unlikely  that  the  stupidest 
or  shallowest  person  would  give  him- 
self away  when  talking  to  him,  for 
it  was  so  clear  that  he  was  always  on 
the  watch  for  admission  or  information 
that  might  be  useful  to  him.  He  had, 
however,  the  charm  that  a  very  active 
and  vivid  mind  always  possesses,  and 
though  small  and  slight,  he  was  a  figure 
that  would  be  noticed  anywhere,  so 
keen  and  wide-awake  was  his  face. 
Beside  him  Mr.  Taynton  looked  like  a 
benevolent  country  clergyman,  more 
distinguished  for  amiable  qualities  of 
the  heart,  than  intellectual  qualities 
of  the  head.  Yet  those  —  there  were 
not  many  of  them  —  who  in  dealings 
with  the  latter  had  tried  to  conduct 
their  business  on  these  assumptions, 
had  invariably  found  it  necessary  to 
reconsider  their  first  impression  of  him. 
His  partner,  however,  was  always  con- 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK        41 

scious  of  a  little  impatience  in  talking  to 
him;  Taynton,  he  would  have  allowed, 
did  not  lack  fine  business  qualities,  but 
he  was  a  little  wanting  in  quickness. 

Mills's  welcome  of  him  was  abrupt. 

"Pleased  to  see  you,"  he  said. 
"Cigar,  drink?  Sit  down,  won't  you? 
What  is  it?" 

' '  I  dropped  in  for  a  chat  on  my  way 
home,"  said  Mr.  Taynton.  "I  have 
been  dining  with  Mrs.  Assheton.  A 
most  pleasant  evening.  What  a  fine 
delicate  face  she  has." 

Mills  bit  off  the  end  of  a  cigar. 

' '  I  take  it  that  you  did  not  come  in 
merely  to  discuss  the  delicacy  of  Mrs. 
Assheton's  face,"  he  said. 

"No,  no,  dear  fellow;  you  are  right 
to  recall  me.  I  too  take  it  —  I  take  it 
that  you  have  found  time  to  go  over 
to  Falmer  yesterday.  How  did  you 
find  Sir  Richard?" 

"I  found  him  well.  I  had  a  long 
talk  with  him." 


42       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

"And  you  managed  to  convey  some- 
thing of  those  very  painful  facts  which 
you  felt  it  was  your  duty  to  bring  to 
his  notice?"  asked  Mr.  Taynton. 

Godfrey  Mills  laughed. 

"I  say,  Taynton,  is  it  really  worth 
while  keeping  it  up  like  this?"  he 
asked.  "It  really  saves  so  much 
trouble  to  talk  straight,  as  I  propose 
to  do.  I  saw  him,  as  I  said,  and 
I  really  managed  remarkably  well. 
I  had  these  admissions  wrung  from 
me,  I  assure  you  it  is  no  less  than 
that,  under  promise  of  the  most  ab- 
solute secrecy.  I  told  him  young 
Assheton  was  leading  an  idle,  extrava- 
gant, and  dissipated  life.  I  said  I  had 
seen  him  three  nights  ago  in  Piccadilly, 
not  quite  sober,  in  company  with  the 
class  of  person  to  whom  one  does  not 
refer  in  polite  society.     Will  that  do?" 

"Ah,    I    can    easily    imagine    how 

painful  you  must  have  found " 

began  Taynton. 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       43 

But  his  partner  interrupted. 

"It  was  rather  painful;  you  have 
spoken  a  true  word  in  jest.  I  felt  a 
brute,  I  tell  you.  But,  as  I  pointed 
out  to  you,  something  of  the  sort  was 
necessary." 

Mr.  Taynton  suddenly  dropped  his 
slightly  clerical  manner. 

"You  have  done  excellently,  my 
dear  friend,"  he  said.  "And  as  you 
pointed  out  to  me,  it  was  indeed 
necessary  to  do  something  of  the  sort. 
I  think  by  now,  your  revelations  have 
already  begun  to  take  effect.  Yes, 
I  think  I  will  take  a  little  brandy  and 
soda.     Thank  you  very  much." 

He  got  up  with  greater  briskness 
than  he  had  hitherto  shown. 

"And  you  are  none  too  soon,"  he 
said.  "Morris,  poor  Morris,  such  a 
handsome  fellow,  confided  to  me  this 
evening  that  he  was  in  love  with  Miss 
Templeton.  He  is  very  much  in 
earnest." 


44        THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

"And  why  do  you  think  my  inter- 
view has  met  with  some  success?" 
asked  Mills. 

"Well,  it  is  only  a  conjecture,  but 
when  Morris  asked  if  he  might  call 
any  time  to-morrow,  Miss  Templeton 
(who  was  also  dining  with  Mrs.  As- 
sheton)  said  that  she  and  her  mother 
would  be  out  all  day  and  not  get 
home  till  late.  It  does  not  strike  me 
as  being  too  fanciful  to  see  in  that 
some  little  trace  perhaps  of  your 
handiwork." 

"Yes,  that  looks  like  me,"  said 
Mills  shortly. 

Mr.  Taynton  took  a  meditative  sip 
at  his  brandy  and  soda. 

"My  evening  also  has  not  been 
altogether  wasted,"  he  said.  "I 
played  what  for  me  was  a  bold  stroke, 
for  as  you  know,  my  dear  fellow,  I 
prefer  to  leave  to  your  nimble  and 
penetrating  mind  things  that  want 
dash  and  boldness.     But  to-night,  yes, 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       45 

I   was   warmed   with   that   wonderful 
port  and  was  bold." 

"What  did  you  do?"  asked  Mills. 

"Well,  I  asked,  I  almost  implored 
dear  Morris  to  give  me  two  or  three 
hours  to-morrow  and  go  through  all 
the  books,  and  satisfy  himself  every- 
thing is  in  order,  and  his  invest- 
ments well  looked  after.  I  told  him 
also  that  the  original  ;^3 0,000  of  his 
had,  owing  to  judicious  management, 
become  ;^4o,ooo.  You  see,  that  is 
unfortunately  a  thing  past  praying 
for.  It  is  so  indubitably  clear  from 
the    earlier    ledgers " 

"But  the  port  must  indeed  have 
warmed  you,"  said  Mills  quickly. 
"Why,  it  was  madness!  What  if  he 
had   consented  ? ' ' 

Mr.  Taynton  smiled. 

"Ah,  well,  I  in  my  slow  synthetic 
manner  had  made  up  my  mind  that 
it  was  really  quite  impossible  that  he 
should  consent  to  go  into  the  books 


46       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

and  vouchers.  To  begin  with,  he  has  a 
new  motor  car,  and  every  hour  spent 
away  from  that  car  just  now  is  to 
his  mind  an  hour  wasted.  Also,  I 
know  him  well.  I  knew  that  he 
would  never  consent  to  spend  several 
hours  over  ledgers.  Finally,  even  if 
he  had,  though  I  knew  from  what  I 
know  of  him  not  that  he  would  not  but 
that  he  could  not,  I  could  have  —  I 
could  have  managed  something.  You 
see,  he  knows  nothing  whatever  about 
business  or  investments." 

Mills  shook  his  head. 

"But  it  was  dangerous,  anyhow," 
he  said,  "and  I  don't  understand  what 
object  could  be  served  by  it.  It  was 
running  a  risk  with  no  profit  in  view." 

Then  for  the  first  time  the  inherent 
strength  of  the  quietness  of  the  one 
man  as  opposed  to  the  obvious  quick- 
ness and  comprehension  of  the  other 
came  into  play. 

"I    think  that  I  disagree  with  you 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       47 

there,  my  dear  fellow,"  said  Mr.  Tayn- 
ton  slowly,  "though  when  I  have 
told  you  all,  I  shall  be  of  course,  as 
always,  delighted  to  recognise  the 
superiority  of  your  judgment,  should 
you  disagree  with  me,  and  convince 
me  of  the  correctness  of  your  view. 
It  has  happened,  I  know,  a  hundred 
times  before  that  you  with  your  quick 
intuitive  perceptions  have  been  right." 

But  his  partner  interrupted  him. 
He  quite  agreed  with  the  sentiment, 
but  he  wanted  to  learn  without  even 
the  delay  caused  by  these  compli- 
mentary remarks,  the  upshot  of 
Taynton's  rash  proposal  to  Morris. 

"What  did  young  Assheton  say?" 
he  asked. 

"Well,  my  dear  fellow,"  said 
Taynton,  "though  I  have  really  no 
doubt  that  in  principle  I  did  a  rash 
thing,  in  actual  practice  my  step 
was  justified,  because  Morris  abso- 
lutely refused  to  look   at  the  books. 


48       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

Of  course  I  know  the  young  fellow  well: 
it  argues  no  perspicuity  on  my  part 
to  have  foreseen  that.  And,  I  am 
glad  to  say,  something  in  my  way  of 
putting  it,  some  sincerity  of  manner 
I  suppose,  gave  rise  to  a  fresh  mark 
of  confidence  in  us  on  his  part." 

Mr.  Taynton  cleared  his  throat;  his 
quietness  and  complete  absence  of 
hurry  was  so  to  speak,  rapidly  over- 
hauling the  quick,  nimble  mind  of  the 
other. 

"He  asked  me  in  fact  to  continue 
being  steward  of  his  affairs  in  any 
event.  Should  he  marry  to-morrow 
I  feel  no  doubt  that  he  would  not 
spend  a  couple  of  minutes  over  his 
financial  affairs,  unless,  unless,  as  you 
foresaw  might  happen,  he  had  need 
of  a  large  lump  sum.  In  that  case, 
my  dear  Mills,  you  and  I  would  — 
would  find  it  impossible  to  live  else- 
where than  in  the  Argentine  Republic, 
were  we  so  fortunate  as  to  get  there. 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       49 

But,  as  far  as  this  goes  I  only  say 
that  the  step  of  mine  which  you  felt 
to  be  dangerous  has  turned  out  most 
auspiciously.  He  begged  me,  in  fact, 
to  continue  even  after  he  came  of  age, 
acting  for  him  at  my  present  rate  of 
remuneration." 

Mr.  Mills  was  listening  to  this  with 
some  attention.  Here  he  laughed 
dryly. 

"That  is  capital,  then,"  he  said. 
"You  were  right  and  I  was  wrong. 
God,  Taynton,  it's  your  manner  you 
know,  there 's  something  of  the  country 
parson  about  you  that  is  wonder- 
fully convincing.  You  seem  sincere 
without  being  sanctimonious.  Why, 
if  I  was  to  ask  young  Assheton  to 
look  into  his  affairs  for  himself,  he 
would  instantly  think  there  was  some- 
thing wrong,  and  that  I  was  trying 
bluff.  But  when  you  do  the  same 
thing,  that  simiple  and  perfectly  cor- 
rect explanation  never  occurs  to  him." 


50       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

"No,  dear  Morris  trusts  me  very 
completely,"  said  Taynton,  "But, 
then,  if  I  may  continue  my  little  re- 
view of  the  situation,  as  it  now  stands, 
you  and  your  talk  with  Sir  Richard 
have  vastly  decreased  the  danger  of 
his  marrying.  For,  to  be  frank,  I 
should  not  feel  at  all  secure  if  that 
happened.  Miss  Templeton  is  an 
heiress  herself,  and  Morris  might  easily 
take  it  into  his  head  to  spend  ten  or 
fifteen  thousand  pounds  in  building 
a  house  or  buying  an  estate,  and 
though  I  think  I  have  guarded  against 
his  requiring  an  account  of  our  ste- 
wardship, I  can't  prevent  his  wishing 
to  draw  a  large  sum  of  money.  But 
your  brilliant  manoeuvre  may,  we 
hope,  effectually  put  a  stop  to  the 
danger  of  his  marrying  Miss  Temple- 
ton,  and  since  I  am  convinced  he  is  in 
love  with  her,  why"  —  Mr.  Taynton 
put  his  plump  finger-tips  together 
and  raised  his  kind  eyes  to  the  ceil- 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       51 

ing  —  ' '  why,  the  chance  of  his  want- 
ing to  marry  anybody  else  is  post- 
poned anyhow,  till,  till  he  has  got 
over  this  unfortunate  attachment. 
In  fact,  my  dear  fellow,  there  is  no 
longer  anything  immediate  to  fear, 
and  I  feel  sure  that  before  many 
weeks  are  up,  the  misfortunes  and  ill 
luck  which  for  the  last  two  years  have 
dogged  us  with  such  incredible  per- 
sistency will  be  repaired." 

Mills  said  nothing  for  the  moment 
but  splashed  himself  out  a  liberal 
allowance  of  brandy  into  his  glass,  and 
mixed  it  with  a  somewhat  more  care- 
fully measured  ration  of  soda.  He 
was  essentially  a  sober  man,  but  that 
was  partly  due  to  the  fact  that  his  head 
was  as  impervious  to  alcohol  as  teak  is 
to  water,  and  it  was  his  habit  to  indulge 
in  two,  and  those  rather  stiff,  brandies 
and  sodas  of  an  evening.  He  found 
that  they  assisted  and  clarified  thought. 

"I    wish    to    heaven    you    hadn't 


52       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

found  it  necessary  to  let  young  As- 
sheton  know  that  his  ;^3o,ooo  had 
increased  to  ;j^4o,ooo,"  he  said. 
"That  's  ;^i 0,000  more  to  get  back." 

"Ah,  it  was  just  that  which  gave 
him,  so  he  thought,  such  good  cause 
for  reposing  complete  confidence  in 
me,"  remarked  Mr.  Taynton.  "But 
as  you  say,  it  is  ;!^i 0,000  more  to  get 
back,  and  I  should  not  have  told  him, 
were  not  certain  ledgers  of  earlier 
years  so  extremely,  extremely  un- 
mistakable on  the  subject." 

"But  if  he  is  not  going  to  look  at 
ledgers  at  all "  began  Mills. 

"Ah,  the  concealment  of  that  sort 
of  thing  is  one  of  the  risks  which  it  is 
not  worth  while  to  take,"  said  the 
other,  dropping  for  a  moment  the 
deferential  attitude. 

Mills  was  silent  again.     Then: 

"Have  you  bought  that  option  in 
Boston  Coppers,"  he  asked. 

"Yes;  I  bought  to-day." 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK        53 

Mills  glanced  at  the  clock  as  Mr. 
Taynton  rose  to  go. 

"Still  only  a  quarter  to  twelve," 
he  said.  "If  you  have  time,  you 
might  give  me  a  detailed  statement. 
I  hardly  know  what  you  have  done. 
It  won't  take  a  couple  of  minutes." 

Mr.  Taynton  glanced  at  the  clock 
likewise,  and  then  put  down  his  hat 
again. 

"  I  can  just  spare  the  time,"  he  said, 
"but  I  must  get  home  by  twelve;  I 
have  unfortunately  come  out  without 
my  latchkey,  and  I  do  not  like  keeping 
the  servants  up." 

He  pressed  his  fingers  over  his  eyes 
a  moment  and  then  spoke. 

Ten  minutes  later  he  was  in  the 
bird-cage  of  the  lift  again,  and  by 
twelve  he  had  been  admitted  into  his 
own  house,  apologising  most  amiably 
to  his  servant  for  having  kept  him 
up.     There  were  a  few  letters  for  him 


54       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

and  he  opened  and  read  those,  then 
lit  his  bed-candle  and  went  upstairs, 
but  instead  of  undressing,  sat  for  a 
full  quarter  of  an  hour  in  his  arm- 
chair thinking.  Then  he  spoke  softly 
to  himself. 

"I  think  dear  Mills  means  mischief 
in  some  way,"  he  said.  "But  really 
for  the  moment  it  puzzles  me  to  know 
what.  However,  I  shall  see  to- 
morrow.    Ah,  I  wonder  if  I  guess!" 

Then  he  went  to  bed,  but  contrary 
to  custom  did  not  get  to  sleep  for  a 
long  time.  But  when  he  did  there 
was  a  smile  on  his  lips;  a  patient 
contented  smile. 


CHAPTER   III 

MR.  TAYNTON'S  statement  to  his 
partner,  which  had  taken  him 
so  few  minutes  to  give,  was  of  course 
concerned  only  with  the  latest  finan- 
cial operation  which  he  had  just 
embarked  in,  but  for  the  sake  of  the 
reader  it  will  be  necessary  to  go  a 
little  further  back,  and  give  quite 
shortly  the  main  features  of  the  situa- 
tion in  which  he  and  his  partner 
found  themselves  placed. 

Briefly  then,  just  two  years  ago, 
at  the  time  peace  was  declared  in  South 
Africa,  the  two  partners  of  Taynton  and 
Mills  had  sold  out  ;^3 0,000  of  Morris 
Assheton's  securities,  which  owing  to 
their  excellent  management  was  then 
worth  ;^4o,ooo,  and  seeing  a  quite 
unrivalled     opportunity    of      making 

55 


56       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

their  fortunes,  had  become  heavy  pur- 
chasers of  South  African  mines,  for 
they  reasoned  that  with  peace  once 
declared  it  was  absolutely  certain  that 
prices  would  go  up.  But,  as  is  some- 
times the  way  with  absolute  certain- 
ties, the  opposite  had  happened  and 
they  had  gone  down.  They  cut  their 
loss,  however,  and  proceeded  to  buy 
American  rails.  In  six  months  they 
had  entirely  repaired  the  damage,  and 
seeing  further  unrivalled  opportunities 
from  time  to  time,  in  buying  motor- 
car shares,  in  running  a  theatre  and 
other  schemes,  had  managed  a  month 
ago  to  lose  all  that  was  left  of  the 
;i^3 0,000.  Being,  therefore,  already  so 
deeply  committed,  it  was  mere 
prudence,  the  mere  instinct  of  self- 
preservation  that  had  led  them  to  sell 
out  the  remaining  ;^i  0,000,  and  to-day 
Mr.  Taynton  had  bought  an  option  in 
Boston  copper  with  it.  The  manner 
of  an  option  is  as  follows: 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       57 

Boston  Copper  to-day  was  quoted 
at  ;^5  los  6d,  and  by  paying  a  premium 
of  twelve  shillings  and  sixpence  per 
share,  they  were  entitled  to  buy  Bos- 
ton Copper  shares  any  time  within 
the  next  three  months  at  a  price  of 
£6  3s.  Supposing  therefore  (as  Mr. 
Taynton  on  very  good  authority  had 
supposed)  that  Boston  Copper,  a 
rapidly  improving  company,  rose  a 
couple  of  points  within  the  next  three 
months,  and  so  stood  at  £•]  los  6d; 
he  had  the  right  of  exercising  his  op- 
tion and  buying  them  at  £6  3  s 
thus  making  ;^i  7s  6d  per  share.  But 
a  higher  rise  than  this  was  confidently 
expected,  and  Taynton,  though  not 
really  of  an  over  sanguine  disposition, 
certainly  hoped  to  make  good  the 
greater  part  if  not  all  of  their  somewhat 
large  defalcations.  He  had  bought 
an  option  of  20,000  shares,  the  option 
of  which  cost  (or  would  cost  at  the  end 
of  those  months)  rather  over  ;^  10,000. 


58       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

In  other  words,  the  moment  that  the 
shares  rose  to  a  price  higher  than 
£6  3s,  all  further  appreciation  was 
pure  gain.  If  they  did  not  rise  so 
high,  he  would  of  course  not  exercise 
the  option,  and  sacrifice  the  money. 
That  was  certainly  a  very  un- 
pleasant thing  to  contemplate,  but 
it  had  been  more  unpleasant  when, 
so  far  as  he  knew,  Morris  was  on  the 
verge  of  matrimony,  and  would  then 
step  into  the  management  of  his 
own  affairs.  But  bad  though  it  all 
was,  the  situation  had  certainly  been 
immensely  ameliorated  this  evening, 
since  on  the  one  hand  his  partner  had, 
it  was  not  unreasonable  to  hope, 
said  to  Madge's  father  things  about 
Morris  that  made  his  marriage  with 
Madge  exceedingly  unlikely,  while  on 
the  other  hand,  even  if  it  happened, 
his  affairs,  according  to  his  own  wish, 
would  remain  in  Mr.  Taynton's  hands 
with  the  same  completeness  as  here- 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK         59 

tofore.  It  would,  of  course,  be  neces- 
sary to  pay  him  his  income,  and 
though  this  would  be  a  great  strain 
on  the  finances  of  the  two  partners, 
it  was  manageable.  Besides  (Mr. 
Taynton  sincerely  hoped  that  this 
would  not  be  necessary)  the  money 
which  was  Mrs.  Assheton's  for  her 
lifetime  was  in  his  hands  also,  so  if 
the  worst  came  to  the  worst 

Now  the  composition  and  nature 
of  the  extraordinary  animal  called 
man  is  so  unexpected  and  unlikely 
that  any  analysis  of  Mr.  Taynton 's 
character  may  seem  almost  grotesque. 
It  is  a  fact  nevertheless  that  his  was  a 
nature  capable  of  great  things,  it  is 
also  a  fact  that  he  had  long  ago  been 
deeply  and  bitterly  contrite  for  the 
original  dishonesty  of  using  the  money 
of  his  client.  But  by  aid  of  those 
strange  perversities  of  nature,  he  had 
by  this  time  honestly   and   sincerely 


6o       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

got  to  regard  all  their  subsequent 
employments  of  it  merely  as  efforts 
on  his  part  to  make  right  an  original 
wrong.  He  wanted  to  repair  his  fault, 
and  it  seemed  to  him  that  to  commit 
it  again  was  the  only  means  at  his 
disposal  for  doing  so.  A  strain,  too, 
of  Puritan  piety  was  bound  up  in  the 
constitution  of  his  soul,  and  in  private 
life  he  exercised  high  morality,  and 
was  also  kind  and  charitable.  He 
belonged  to  guilds  and  societies  that 
had  as  their  object  the  improvement 
and  moral  advancement  of  young 
men.  He  was  a  liberal  patron  of 
educational  schemes,  he  sang  a  fer- 
vent and  fruity  tenor  in  the  choir  of 
St.  Agnes,  he  was  aregular communicant, 
his  nature  looked  toward  good,  and 
turned  its  eyes  away  from  evil.  To  do 
him  justice  he  was  not  a  hypocrite, 
though,  if  all  about  him  were  known, 
and  a  plebiscite  taken,  it  is  probable 
that  he  would  be  unanimously  con- 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       6i 

demned.  Yet  the  universal  opinion 
would  be  wrong:  he  was  no  hypocrite, 
but  only  had  the  bump  of  self-preser- 
vation enormously  developed.  He  had 
cheated  and  swindled,  but  he  was 
genuinely  opposed  to  cheating  and 
swindling.  He  was  cheating  and 
swindling  now,  in  buying  the  option 
of  Boston  Copper.  But  he  did  not 
know  that:  he  wanted  to  repair  the 
original  wrong,  to  hand  back  to  Morris 
his  fortune  unimpaired,  and  also  to 
save  himself.  But  of  these  two  wants, 
the  second,  it  must  be  confessed,  was 
infinitely  the  stronger.  To  save  him- 
self there  was  perhaps  nothing  that 
he  would  stick  at.  However,  it  was 
his  constant  wish  and  prayer  that  he 
might  not  be  led  into  temptation. 
He  knew  well  what  his  particular 
temptation  was,  namely  this  instinct 
of  self-preservation,  and  constantly 
thought  and  meditated  about  it.  He 
knew    that    he    was    hardly    himself 


62       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

when  the  stress  of  it  came  on  him; 
it  was  like  a  possession. 

Mills,  though  an  excellent  partner 
and  a  man  of  most  industrious  habits, 
had,  so  Mr.  Taynton  would  have  ad- 
mitted, one  little  weak  spot.  He 
never  was  at  the  office  till  rather  late 
in  the  morning.  True,  when  he  came, 
he  soon  made  up  for  lost  time,  for  he 
was  possessed,  as  we  have  seen,  of 
a  notable  quickness  and  agility  of 
mind,  but  sometimes  Taynton  found 
that  he  was  himself  forced  to  be 
idle  till  Mills  turned  up,  if  his  signa- 
ture or  what  not  was  required  for 
papers  before  work  could  be  further 
proceeded  with.  This,  in  fact,  was 
the  case  next  morning,  and  from  half 
past  eleven  Mr.  Taynton  had  to  sit 
idly  in  his  office,  as  far  as  the  work 
of  the  firm  was  concerned  until  his 
partner  arrived.  It  was  a  little  tire- 
some that  this  should  happen  to-day, 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       63 

because  there  was  nothing  else  that 
need  detain  him,  except  those  deeds 
for  the  execution  of  which  his  partner's 
signature  was  necessary,  and  he  could, 
if  only  Mills  had  been  punctual,  have 
gone  out  to  Rottingdean  before  lunch, 
and  inspected  the  Church  school  there 
in  the  erection  of  which  he  had  taken 
so  energetic  an  interest.  Timmins, 
however,  the  gray-haired  old  head 
clerk,  was  in  the  office  with  him,  and 
Mr.  Taynton  always  liked  a  chat  with 
Timmins. 

"And  the  grandson  just  come  home, 
has  he  Mr.  Timmins?"  he  was  saying. 
"I  must  come  and  see  him.  Why 
he  '11  be  six  years  old,  won't  he,  by 
now  ? ' ' 

"Yes,  sir,  turned  six." 

"Dear  me,  how  time  goes  on!  The 
morning  is  going  on,  too,  and  still  Mr. 
Mills  isn't  here." 

He  took  a  quill  pen  and  drew  a 
half  sheet  of  paper  toward  him,  poised 


64       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

his    pen   a   moment   and   then  wrote 
quickly. 

"What  a  pity  I  can't  sign  for  him," 
he  said,  passing  his  paper  over  to  the 
clerk.  "Look  at  that;  now  even  you, 
Timmins,  though  you  have  seen  Mr. 
Mills's  handwriting  ten  thousand  times, 
would  be  ready  to  swear  that  the 
signature  was  his,  would  you  not?" 

Timmins  looked  scrutinisingly  at  it. 

"Well,  I  'm  sure,  sir!  What  a  forger 
you  would  have  made! "  he  said  admir- 
ingly. ' '  I  would  have  sworn  that  was 
Mr.  Mills's  own  hand  of  write.  It  's 
wonderful,  sir." 

Mr.  Taynton  sighed,  and  took  the 
paper  again. 

"Yes,  it  is  like,  isn't  it?"  he  said, 
'  'and  it 's  so  easy  to  do.  Luckily  forgers 
don't  know  the  way  to  forge  properly." 

"And  what  might  that  be,  sir?" 
asked  Timmins. 

"Why,  to  throw  yourself  mentally 
into   the   nature   of   the   man    whose 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       65 

handwriting  you  wish  to  forge.  Of 
course  one  has  to  know  the  hand- 
writing thoroughly  well,  but  if  one 
does  that  one  just  has  to  visualise  it, 
and  then,  as  I  said,  project  oneself 
into  the  other,  not  laboriously  copy 
the  handwriting.  Let 's  try  another. 
Ah,  who  is  that  letter  from?  Mrs. 
Assheton  is  n't  it.  Let  me  look  at 
the  signature  just  once  again." 

Mr.  Taynton  closed  his  eyes  a  moment 
after  looking  at  it.  Then  he  took  his 
quill,  and  wrote  quickly. 

"You  would  swear  to  that,  too, 
would  you  not,  Timmins?"  he  asked. 

"Why,  God  bless  me  yes,  sir," 
said  he.     "Swear  to  it  on  the  book." 

The  door  opened  and  as  Godfrey 
Mills  came  in,  Mr.  Taynton  tweaked 
the  paper  out  of  Timmins's  hand,  and 
tore  it  up.  It  might  perhaps  seem 
strange  to  dear  Mills  that  his  partner 
had  been  forging  his  signature,  though 
only  in  jest. 


66       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

"  'Fraid  I  'm  rather  late,"  said  Mills. 

"Not  at  all,  my  dear  fellow,"  said 
Taynton  without  the  slightest  touch  of 
ill-humour.  "How  are  you?  There  's 
very  little  to  do;  I  want  your  signature 
to  this  and  this,  and  your  careful 
perusal  of  that.  Mrs.  Assheton's  letter? 
No,  that  only  concerns  me;  I  have 
dealt  with  it." 

A  quarter  of  an  hour  was  sufficient, 
and  at  the  end  Timmins  carried  the 
papers  away  leaving  the  two  partners 
together.  Then,  as  soon  as  the  door 
closed,  Mills  spoke. 

"I  've  been  thinking  over  our  conver- 
sation of  last  night,"  he  said,  "and 
there  are  some  points  I  don't  think 
you  have  quite  appreciated,  which  I 
should  like  to  put  before  you." 

Something  inside  Mr.  Taynton 's brain, 
the  same  watcher  perhaps  who  looked 
at  Morris  so  closely  the  evening  before, 
said  to  him.  "He  is  going  to  try  it 
on."     But  it  was  not  the  watcher  but 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       67 

his  normal  self  that  answered.  He 
beamed  gently  on  his  partner. 

' '  My  dear  fellow,  I  might  have  been 
sure  that  your  quick  mind  would  have 
seen  new  aspects,  new  combinations," 
he  said. 

Mills  leaned  forward  over  the  table. 

"Yes,  I  have  seen  new  aspects,  to 
adopt  your  words,"  he  said,  "and  I 
will  put  them  before  you.  These  finan- 
cial operations,  shall  we  call  them, 
have  been  going  on  for  two  years  now, 
have  they  not?  You  began  by  losing 
a  large  sum  in  South  Africans " 

"We  began," corrected  Mr. Taynton, 
gently.  He  was  looking  at  the  other 
quite  calmly;  his  face  expressed  no 
surprise  at  all;  if  there  was  anything 
in  his  expression  beyond  that  of  quiet 
kindness,  it  was  perhaps  pity. 

"  I  said  'you,'  "  said  Mills  in  a  hector- 
ing tone,  ' '  and  I  will  soon  explain  why. 
You  lost  a  large  sum  in  South  Africans, 
but  won  it  back  again  in  Americans. 


68       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

You  then  again,  and  again  contrary 
to  my  advice,  embarked  in  perfect 
wild-cat  affairs,  which  ended  in  our  — 
I  say  '  our '  here  —  getting  severely 
scratched  and  mauled.  Altogether 
you  have  frittered  away  ;;^3 0,000,  and 
have  placed  the  remaining  ten  in  a 
venture  which  to  my  mind  is  as  wild 
as  all  the  rest  of  your  unfortunate 
ventures.  These  speculations  have, 
almost  without  exception,  been  choices 
of  your  own,  not  mine.  That  was 
one  of  the  reasons  why  I  said  '  you,  * 
not  'we.'" 

He  paused  a  moment. 

"Another  reason  is,"  he  said,  "be- 
cause without  any  exception  the  trans- 
actions have  taken  place  on  your  advice 
and  in  your  name,  not  in  mine." 

That  was  a  sufficiently  meaning 
statement,  but  Mills  did  not  wish  his 
partner  to  be  under  any  misappre- 
hension as  to  what  he  implied. 

"In  other  words,"  he  said,  "I  can 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       69 

deny  absolutely  all  knowledge  of  the 
whole  of  those  operations." 

Mr.  Taynton  gave  a  sudden  start, 
as  if  the  significance  of  this  had 
only  this  moment  dawned  on  him, 
as  if  he  had  not  understood  the  first 
statement.  Then  he  seemed  to  collect 
himself. 

"You  can  hardly  do  that,"  he  said, 
"as  I  hold  letters  of  yours  which  imply 
such  knowledge." 

Mills  smiled  rather  evilly. 

"Ah,  it  is  not  worth  while  bluffing," 
he  said.  "I  have  never  written  such 
a  letter  to  you.  You  know  it.  Is  it 
likely  I  should?" 

Mr.  Taynton  apparently  had  no  re- 
ply to  this.  But  he  had  a  question 
to  ask. 

' '  Why  are  you  taking  up  this  hostile 
and  threatening  attitude?" 

' '  I  have  not  meant  to  be  hostile, 
and  I  have  certainly  not  threatened," 
replied    Mills.     "I    have    put    before 


70       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

you,  quite  dispassionately  I  hope, 
certain  facts.  Indeed  I  should  say 
it  was  you  who  had  threatened  in 
the  matter  of  those  letters,  which, 
unhappily,  have  never  existed  at  all. 
I  will  proceed." 

* '  Now  what  has  been  my  part  in 
this  affair?  I  have  observed  you  lost 
money  in  speculations  of  which  I  dis- 
approved, but  you  always  knew  best.  I 
have  advanced  money  to  you  before 
now  to  tide  over  embarrassments  that 
would  otherwise  have  been  disastrous. 
By  the  exercise  of  diplomacy  —  or 
lying  —  yesterday,  I  averted  a  very 
grave  danger.  I  point  out  to  you 
also  that  there  is  nothing  to  implicate 
me  in  these  —  these  fraudulent  em- 
ployments of  a  client's  money.  So 
I  ask,  where  I  come  in?  What  do 
I  get  by  it?" 

Mr.  Taynton's  hands  were  trembling 
as  he  fumbled  at  some  papers  on 
his  desk. 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       71 

"You  know  quite  well  that  we  are 
to  share  all  profits?"  he  said. 

"Yes,  but  at  present  there  have 
not  been  any.  I  have  been,  to  put 
it  plainly,  pulling  you  out  of  holes. 
And  I  think  —  I  think  my  trouble 
ought  to  be  remunerated.  I  sincerely 
hope  you  will  take  that  view  also. 
Or  shall  I  remind  you  again  that 
there  is  nothing  in  the  world  to  con- 
nect  me   with   these,    well,    frauds?" 

Mr.  Taynton  got  up  from  his  chair, 
strolled  across  to  the  window  where 
he  drew  down  the  blind  a  little,  so 
as  to  shut  out  the  splash  of  sunlight 
that  fell  on  his  table. 

"You  have  been  betting  again,  I 
suppose,"  he  asked  quietly. 

"Yes,  and  have  been  unfortunate. 
Pray  do  not  trouble  to  tell  me  again 
how  foolish  it  is  to  gamble  like  that. 
You  may  be  right.  I  have  no  doubt 
you  are  right.  But  I  think  one  has 
as  much  right  to  gamble  with  one's 


72       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

own  money  as  to  do  so  with  the  money  of 
other  people." 

This  apparently  seemed  unanswer- 
able; anyhow  Mr.  Taynton  made 
no  reply.  Then,  having  excluded 
the  splash  of  sunlight  he  sat  down 
again. 

"You  have  not  threatened,  you  tell 
me,"  he  said,  "but  you  have  pointed 
out  to  me  that  there  is  no  evidence 
that  you  have  had  a  hand  in  certain 
transactions.  You  say  that  I  know 
you  have  helped  me  in  these  tran- 
sactions; you  say  you  require  re- 
muneration for  your  services.  Does 
not  that,  I  ask,  imply  a  threat? 
Does  it  not  mean  that  you  are 
blackmailing  me?  Else  why  should 
you  bring  these  facts  —  I  do  not 
dispute  them  —  to  my  notice  ? 
Supposing  I  refuse  you  remuner- 
ation?" 

Mills  had  noted  the  signs  of  agita- 
tion  and   anxiety.     He   felt   that   he 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       73 

was  on  safe  ground.  The  black- 
mailer lives  entirely  on  the  want  of 
courage  in  his  victims. 

"You  will  not,  I  hope,  refuse  me 
remuneration,"  he  said.  "I  have 
not  threatened  you  yet,  because  I 
feel  sure  you  will  be  wise.  I  might, 
of  course,  subsequently  threaten  you." 

Again  there  was  silence.  Mr. 
Taynton  had  picked  up  a  quill 
pen,  the  same  with  which  he  had 
been  writing  before,  for  the  nib  was 
not   yet  dry. 

"The  law  is  rather  severe  on  black- 
mailers," he  remarked. 

"It  is.  Are  you  going  to  bring  an 
action  against  me  for  blackmail? 
Will  not  that  imply  the  re-opening 
of  —  of  certain  ledgers,  which  we 
agreed  last  night  had  better  remain 
shut?" 

Again  there  was  silence.  There  was 
a  completeness  in  this  reasoning  which 
rendered  comment  superfluous. 


74       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

"How  much  do  you  want?"  asked 
Mr.  Taynton. 

Mills  was  not  so  foolish  as  to 
"breathe  a  sigh  of  relief."  But  he 
noted  with  satisfaction  that  there 
was  no  sign  of  fight  in  his  adversary 
and  partner. 

"I  want  two  thousand  pounds," 
he  said,   "at  once." 

"That  is  a  large  sum." 

"It  is.  If  it  were  a  small  sum  I 
should  not  trouble  you." 

Mr.  Taynton  again  got  up  and  strayed 
aimlessly  about  the  room. 

"I  can't  give  it  you  to-day,"  he 
said.  "I  shall  have  to  sell  out  some 
stock." 

"I  am  not  unreasonable  about  a 
reasonable  delay,"  said  Mills. 

"You  are  going  to  town  this 
afternoon?" 

"Yes,  I  must.  There  is  a  good  deal 
of  work  to  be  done.  It  will  take  me 
all  to-morrow." 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK        75 

"And  you  will  be  back  the  day- 
after  to-morrow?" 

"Yes,  I  shall  be  back  here  that 
night,  that  is  to  say,  I  shall  not  get 
away  from  town  till  the  afternoon. 
I  should  like  your  definite  answer 
then,  if  it  is  not  inconvenient.  I 
could  come  and  see  you  that  night,  the 
day  after  to-morrow  —  if  you  wished." 

Mr.  Taynton  thought  over  this  with 
liis  habitual  deliberation. 

"You  will  readily  understand  that 
all  friendly  relations  between  us  are 
quite  over,"  he  said.  "You  have 
done  a  cruel  and  wicked  thing,  but  I 
don't  see  how  I  can  resist  it.  I 
should  like,  however,  to  have  a  little 
further  talk  about  it,  for  which  I 
have  not  time  now." 

Mills  rose. 

"By  all  means,"  he  said.  "I  do 
not  suppose  I  shall  be  back  here  till 
nine  in  the  evening.  I  have  had  no 
exercise    lately,    and    I    think    very 


76       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

likely  I  shall  get  out  of  the  train  at 
Falmer,  and  walk  over  the  downs." 

Mr.  Taynton's  habitual  courtesy  came 
to  his  aid.  He  would  have  been 
polite  to  a  thief  or  a  murderer,  if  he 
met  him  socially. 

"Those  cool  airs  of  the  downs  are 
very  invigorating."  he  said.  "I  will 
not  expect  you  therefore  till  half  past 
nine  that  night.  I  shall  dine  at  home, 
and  be  alone." 

"Thanks.  I  must  be  going.  I  shall 
only  just  catch  my  train  to  town." 

Mills  nodded  a  curt  gesture  of  fare- 
well, and  left  the  room,  and  when  he 
had  gone  Mr.  Taynton  sat  down  again 
in  the  chair  by  the  table,  and  remained 
there  some  half  hour.  He  knew  well 
the  soundness  of  his  partner's  reason- 
ing; all  he  had  said  was  fatally  and 
abominably  true.  There  was  no  way 
out  of  it.  Yet  to  pay  money  to  a 
blackmailer  was,  to  the  legal  mind, 
a  confession  of  guilt.     Innocent  people, 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       77 

unless  they  were  abject  fools,  did  not 
pay  blackmail.  They  prosecuted  the 
blackmailer.  Yet  here,  too,  Mills's 
simple  reasoning  held  good.  He  could 
not  prosecute  the  blackmailer,  since 
he  was  not  in  the  fortunate  position  of 
being  innocent.  But  if  you  paid  a 
blackmailer  once,  you  were  for  ever 
in  his  power.  Having  once  yielded, 
it  was  necessary  to  yield  again.  He 
must  get  some  assurance  that  no 
further  levy  would  take  place.  He 
must  satisfy  himself  that  he  would 
be  quit  of  all  future  danger  from  this 
quarter.  Yet  from  whence  was  such 
assurance  to  come?  He  might  have  it 
a  hundred  times  over  in  Godfrey 
Mills's  handwriting,  but  he  could 
never  produce  that  as  evidence,  since 
again  the  charge  of  fraudulent  em- 
ployment of  clients'  money  would 
be  in  the  air.  No  doubt,  of  course, 
the  blackmailer  would  be  sentenced, 
but    the    cause    of    blackmail    would 


78       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

necessarily  be  public.  No,  there  was 
no  way  out. 

Two  thousand  pounds,  though! 
Frugally  and  simply  as  he  lived,  that 
was  to  him  a  dreadful  sum,  and 
represented  the  savings  of  at  least 
eighteen  months.  This  meant  that 
there  was  for  him  another  eighteen 
months  of  work,  just  when  he  hoped 
to  see  his  retirement  coming  close  to 
him.  Mills  demanded  that  he  should 
work  an  extra  year  and  a  half,  and  out 
of  those  few  years  that  in  all  human 
probability  still  remained  to  him  in 
this  pleasant  world.  Yet  there  was 
no  way  out! 

Half  an  hour's  meditation  convinced 
him  of  this,  and,  as  was  his  sensible  plan, 
when  a  thing  was  inevitable,  he  never 
either  fought  against  it  nor  wasted 
energy  in  regretting  it.  And  he  went 
slowly  out  of  the  office  into  which  he 
had  come  so  briskly  an  hour  or  two 
before.     But  his  face  expressed  no  sign 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       79 

of  disquieting  emotion ;  he  nodded  kindly 
to  Timmins,  and  endorsed  his  desire  to 
be  allowed  to  come  and  see  the  grandson. 
If  anything  was  on  his  mind,  or  if  he 
was  revolving  some  policy  for  the 
future,  it  did  not  seem  to  touch  or 
sour  that  kindly,  pleasant  face. 


CHAPTER   IV 

MR.  TAYNTONdid  not  let  these 
very  unpleasant  occurrences 
interfere  with  the  usual  and  beneficent 
course  of  his  life,  but  faced  the  crisis 
with  that  true  bravery  that  not  only 
meets  a  thing  without  flinching,  but 
meets  it  with  the  higher  courage  of 
cheerfulness,  serenity  and  ordinary 
behaviour.  He  spent  the  rest  of  the 
day  in  fact  in  his  usual  manner,  enjoy- 
ing his  bathe  before  lunch,  his  hour  of 
the  paper  and  the  quiet  cigar  after- 
ward, his  stroll  over  the  springy  turf 
of  the  downs,  and  he  enjoyed  also  the 
couple  of  hours  of  work  that  brought 
him  to  dinner  time.  Then  afterward 
he  spent  his  evening,  as  was  his  weekly 
custom,  at  the  club  for  young  men 
which  he  had  founded,  where  instead  of 
80 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       8i 

being  exposed  to  the  evening  lures  of 
the  sea-front  and  the  public  house,  they 
could  spend  (on  payment  of  a  really 
nominal  subscription)  a  quieter  and 
more  innocent  hour  over  chess,  baga- 
telle and  the  illustrated  papers,  or  if 
more  energetically  disposed,  in  the 
airy  gymnasium  adjoining  the  reading- 
room,  where  they  could  indulge  in 
friendly  rivalry  with  boxing  gloves 
or  single-stick,  or  feed  the  appetites  of 
their  growing  muscles  with  dumb-bells 
and  elastic  contrivances.  Mr.  Taynton 
had  spent  a  couple  of  hours  there, 
losing  a  game  of  chess  to  one  youthful 
adversary,  but  getting  back  his  laurels 
over  bagatelle,  and  before  he  left,  had 
arranged  for  a  geological  expedition  to 
visit,  on  the  Whitsuntide  bank  holiday 
next  week,  the  curious  raised  beach 
which  protruded  so  remarkably  from  the 
range  of  chalk  downs  some  ten  miles 
away. 

On  returning  home,  it  is  true  he  had 


82       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

deviated  a  little  from  his  usual  habits, 
for  instead  of  devoting  the  half-hour 
before  bed-time  to  the  leisurely  perusal 
of  the  evening  paper,  he  had  merely 
given  it  one  glance,  observing  that 
copper  was  strong  and  that  Boston 
Copper  in  particular  had  risen  half  a 
point,  and  had  then  sat  till  bed-time 
doing  nothing  whatever,  a  habit  to 
which  he  was  not  generall}^  addicted. 

He  was  seated  in  his  office  next 
morning  and  was  in  fact  on  the  point 
of  leaving  for  his  bathe,  for  this  hot 
genial  June  was  marching  on  its  sunny 
way  uninterrupted  by  winds  or  rain, 
when  Mr.  Timmins,  after  discreetly 
tapping,  entered,  and  closed  the  door 
behind  him. 

' '  Mr.  Morris  Assheton,  sir,  to  see  you, ' ' 
he  said.  "  I  said  I  would  find  out  if  you 
were  disengaged,  and  could  hardly  re- 
strain him  from  coming  in  with  me. 
The  young  gentleman  seems  very  ex- 
cited and  agitated.  Hardly  himself,  sir. ' ' 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       83 

"Indeed,  show  him  in,"  said  Mr. 
Taynton. 

A  moment  afterward  the  door  burst 
open  and  banged  to  again  behind 
Morris.  High  colour  flamed  in  his 
face,  his  black  eyes  sparkled  with 
vivid  dangerous  light,  and  he  had  no 
salutation  for  his  old  friend. 

"I  ' ve  come  on  a  very  unpleasant 
business,"  he  said,  his  voice  not  in 
control. 

Mr.  Taynton  got  up.  He  had  only 
had  one  moment  of  preparation  and 
he  thought,  at  any  rate,  that  he  knew 
for  certain  what  this  unpleasant  busi- 
ness must  be.  Evidently  Mills  had 
given  him  away.  For  what  reason 
he  had  done  so  he  could  not  guess; 
after  his  experience  of  yesterday  it 
might  have  been  from  pure  devilry, 
or  again  he  might  have  feared  that  in 
desperation,  Taynton  would  take  that 
extreme  step  of  prosecuting  him  for 
blackmail.     But,    for    that    moment 


84       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

Taynton  believed  that  Morris's  agita- 
tion must  be  caused  by  this,  and  it  says 
much  for  the  iron  of  his  nerve  that  he 
did  not  betray  himself  by  a  tremor. 

"My  dear  Morris,"  he  said,  "I 
must  ask  you  to  pull  yourself  together. 
You  are  out  of  your  own  control. 
Sit  down,  please,  and  be  silent  for  a 
minute.  Then  tell  me  calmly  what 
is  the  matter. 

Morris  sat  down  as  he  was  told, 
but  the  calmness  was  not  conspicuous. 

"Calm?"  he  said.  "Would  you  be 
calm  in  my  circumstances,  do  you 
think?" 

"You  have  not  yet  told  me  what 
they  are,"  said  Mr.  Taynton. 

"I  've  just  seen  Madge  Templeton," 
he  said.  "I  met  her  privately  by 
appointment.  And  she  told  me  —  she 
told  me " 

Master  of  himself  though  he  was, 
Mr.  Taynton  had  one  moment  of  phy- 
sical giddiness,  so  complete  and  sudden 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       85 

was  the  revulsion  and  reaction  that 
took  place  in  his  brain.  A  moment 
before  he  had  known,  he  thought,  for 
certain  that  his  own  utter  ruin  was 
imminent.  Now  he  knew  that  it  was 
not  that,  and  though  he  had  made 
one  wrong  conjecture  as  to  what  the 
unpleasant  business  was,  he  did  not 
think  that  his  second  guess  was  far 
astray. 

"Take  your  time,  Morris,"  he  said. 
"And,  my  dear  boy,  try  to  calm  your- 
self. You  say  I  should  not  be  calm  in 
your  circumstances.  Perhaps  I  should 
not,  but  I  should  make  an  effort. 
Tell  me  everything  slowly,  omitting 
nothing." 

This  speech,  combined  with  the 
authoritative  personality  of  Mr. 
Taynton,  had  an  extraordinary  effect 
on  Morris.  He  sat  quiet  a  moment  or 
two,  then  spoke. 

"Yes,  you  are  quite  right,"  he  said, 
"and  after  all  I  have  only  conjecture 


86       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

to  go  on  yet,  and  I  have  been  behaving 
as  if  it  was  proved  truth.  God!  if  it 
is  proved  to  be  true,  though,  I  '11 
expose  him,  I  '11  —  I  '11  horsewhip  him, 
I  '11  murder  him!" 

Mr.  Ta}'nton  slapped  the  table  with 
his  open  hand. 

"Now,  Morris,  none  of  these  wild 
words,"  he  said.  "I  will  not  listen  to 
you  for  a  moment,  if  you  do  not 
control  yourself." 

Once  again,  and  this  time  more 
permanently  the  man's  authority  as- 
serted itself.  Morris  again  sat  silent 
for  a  time,  then  spoke  evenly  and 
quietly. 

"Two  nights  ago  you  were  dining 
with  us,"  he  said,  "and  Madge  was 
there.  Do  you  remember  my  asking 
her  if  I  might  come  to  see  them,  and 
she  said  she  and  her  mother  would  be 
out  all  day?" 

"Yes;  I  remember  perfectly,"  said 
Mr.  Taynton. 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       87 

* '  Well,  yesterday  afternoon  I  was 
motoring  by  the  park,  and  I  saw 
Madge  sitting  on  the  lawn.  I  stopped 
the  motor  and  watched.  She  sat  there 
for  nearly  an  hour,  and  then  Sir 
Richard  came  out  of  the  house  and 
they  walked  up  and  down  the  lawn 
together." 

' '  Ah,  you  must  have  been  mistaken, ' ' 
said  Mr.  Taynton.  "I  know  the  spot 
you  mean  on  the  road,  where  you  can 
see  the  lawn,  but  it  's  half  a  mile  off. 
It  must  have  been  some  friend  of 
hers  perhaps  staying  in   the   house." 

Morris  shook  his  head. 

"I  was  not  mistaken,"  he  said. 
"For  yesterday  evening  I  got  a  note 
from  her,  saying  she  had  posted  it 
secretly,  but  that  she  must  see  me, 
though  she  was  forbidden  to  do  so, 
or  to  hold  any  communication  with 
me." 

"Forbidden?"  ejaculated  Mr. 
Taynton. 


88       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

"Yes,  forbidden.  Well,  this  morn- 
ing I  went  to  the  place  she  named, 
outside  on  the  downs  beyond  the 
park  gate  and  saw  her.  Somebody- 
has  been  telling  vile  lies  about  me  to 
her  father.  I  think  I  know  who  it 
is." 

Mr.  Taynton  held  up  his  hand. 

"Stop,"  he  said,  "let  us  have  your 
conjecture  afterward.  Tell  me  first 
not  what  you  guess,  but  what  hap- 
pened. Arrange  it  all  in  your  mind, 
tell  it  me  as  connectedly  as  you  can." 

Morris  paused  a  moment. 

"Well,  I  met  Madge  as  I  told  you, 
and  this  was  her  story.  Three  days 
ago  she  and  her  father  and  mother 
were  at  lunch,  and  they  had  been 
talking  in  the  most  friendly  way 
about  me,  and  it  was  arranged  to  ask 
me  to  spend  all  yesterday  with  them. 
Madge,  as  you  know,  the  next  night 
was  dining  with  us,  and  it  was  agreed 
that    she    should    ask    me    verball}'. 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       89 

After  lunch  she  and  her  father  went 
out  riding,  and  when  they  returned 
they  found  that  your  partner  Mills, 
had  come  to  call.  He  stayed  for  tea, 
and  after  tea  had  a  talk  alone  with 
Sir  Richard,  while  she  and  her  mother 
sat  out  on  the  lawn.  Soon  after  he 
had  gone,  Sir  Richard  sent  for  Lady 
Templet  on,  and  it  was  nearly  dressing- 
time  when  she  left  him  again.  She 
noticed  at  dinner  that  both  her  father 
and  mother  seemed  very  grave,  and 
when  Madge  went  up  to  bed,  her 
mother  said  that  perhaps  they  had 
better  not  ask  me  over,  as  there  was 
some  thought  of  their  being  away  all 
day.  Also  if  I  suggested  coming  over, 
when  Madge  dined  with  us,  she  was 
to  give  that  excuse.  That  was  all 
she  was  told  for  the  time  being." 

Morris  paused  again. 

"You  are  telling  this  very  clearly 
and  well,  my  dear  boy,"  said  the 
lawyer,  very  gravely  and  kindly. 


90       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

"It  is  so  simple,"  said  he  with  a 
biting  emphasis.  "Then  next  morn- 
ing after  breakfast  her  father  sent  for 
her.  He  told  her  that  they  had 
learned  certain  things  about  me  which 
made  them  think  it  better  not  to  see 
any  more  of  me.  What  they  were, 
she  was  not  told,  but,  I  was  not,  it 
appeared,  the  sort  of  person  with 
whom  they  chose  to  associate.  Now, 
before  God,  those  things  that  they 
were  told,  whatever  they  were,  were 
lies.     I  lead  a  straight  and  sober  life." 

Mr.  Taynton  was  attending  very 
closely. 

"Thank  God,  Madge  did  not  believe 
a  word  of  it,"  said  Morris,  his  face 
suddenly  flushing,  "and  like  a  brick, 
and  a  true  friend  she  wrote  at  once 
to  me,  as  I  said,  in  order  to  tell  me 
all  this.  We  talked  over,  too,  who  it 
could  have  been  who  had  said  these 
vile  things  to  her  father.  There  was 
only  one  person  who  could.     She  had 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       91 

ridden  with  her  father  till  tea-time. 
Then  came  your  partner.  Sir  Richard 
saw  nobody  else;  nobody  else  called 
that  afternoon;  no  post  came  in." 

Mr.  Taynton  had  sprung  up  and  was 
walking  up  and  down  the  room  in 
great  agitation. 

"I  can't  believe  that,"  he  said. 
"There  must  be  some  other  expla- 
nation. Godfrey  Mills  say  those  things 
about  you!  It  is  incredible.  My  dear 
boy,  until  it  is  proved,  you  really 
must  not  let  yourself  believe  that  to 
be  possible.  You  can't  believe  such 
wickedness  against  a  man,  one,  too, 
whom  I  have  known  and  trusted  for 
years,  on  no  evidence.  There  is  no 
direct  evidence  yet.  Let  us  leave  that 
alone  for  the  moment.  What  are 
you  going  to  do  now?" 

* '  I  came  here  to  see  him, ' '  said 
Morris.  "But  I  am  told  he  is  away. 
So  I  thought  it  better  to  tell  you." 

"Yes,  quite  right.     And  what  else?" 


92       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

"I  have  written  to  Sir  Richard, 
demanding,  in  common  justice,  that  he 
should  see  me,  should  tell  me  what  he 
has  heard  against  me,  and  who  told  him. 
I  don't  think  he  will  refuse.  I  don't 
see  how  he  can  refuse.  I  have  asked 
him  to  see  me  to-morrow  afternoon." 

Mr.  Taynton  mentally  examined  this 
in  all  its  bearings.  Apparently  it 
satisfied  him. 

"You  have  acted  wisely  and  provi- 
dently," he  said.  "But  I  want  to 
beg  you,  until  you  have  definite  infor- 
mation, to  forbear  from  thinking  that 
my  dear  Mills  could  conceivably  have 
been  the  originator  of  these  scandalous 
tales,  tales  which  I  know  from  my 
knowledge  of  you  are  impossible  to  be 
true.  From  what  I  know  of  him, 
however,  it  is  impossible  he  could 
have  said  such  things.  I  cannot 
believe  him  capable  of  a  mean  or 
deceitful  action,  and  that  he  should 
be  guilty   of   such  unfathomable  ini- 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       93 

quity  is  simply  out  of  the  question. 
You  must  assume  him  innocent  till 
his  guilt  is  proved." 

"But  who  else  could  it  have  been?' 
cried  Morris,  his  voice  rising  again. 

"It  could  not  have  been  he,"  said 
Taynton  firmly. 

There  was  a  long  silence;  then 
Morris  rose. 

"There  is  one  thing  more,"  he  said, 
"which  is  the  most  important  of  all. 
This  foul  scandal  about  me,  of  course, 
I  know  will  be  cleared  up,  and  I  shall 
be  competent  to  deal  with  the  offender. 
But  —  but  Madge  and  I  said  other 
things  to  each  other.  I  told  her  what 
I  told  you,  that  I  loved  her.  And 
she  loves  me." 

The  sternness,  the  trouble,  the  anxiety 
all  melted  from  Mr.  Taynton's  face. 

"Ah,  my  dear  fellow,  my  dear 
fellow,"  he  said  with  outstretched 
hands.  Thank  you  for  telling  me.  I 
am  delighted,  overjoyed,  and  indeed, 


94       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

as  you  say,  that  is  far  more  important 
than  anything  else.  My  dear  Morris, 
and  is  not  your  mother  charmed?" 

Morris  shook  his  head. 

' '  I  have  not  told  her  yet,  and  I  shall 
not  till  this  is  cleared  up.  It  is  her 
birthday  the  day  after  to-morrow; 
perhaps  I  shall  be  able  to  tell  her  then." 

He  rose. 

"I  must  go,"  he  said.  "And  I 
will  do  all  I  can  to  keep  my  mind  off 
accusing  him,  until  I  know.  But 
when  I  think  of  it,  I  see  red." 

Mr.  Taynton  patted  his  shoulder 
affectionately. 

* '  I  should  have  thought  that  you 
had  got  something  to  think  about, 
which  would  make  it  easy  for  you  to 
prevent  your  thoughts  straying  else- 
where," he  said. 

' '  I  shall  need  all  the  distractions 
I  can  get,"  said  Morris  rather  grimly. 

Morris  walked   quickly  back  along 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       95 

the  sea  front  toward  Sussex  Square, 
and  remembered  as  he  went  that  he  had 
not  yet  bought  any  gift  for  his  mother 
on  her  birthday.  There  was  some- 
thing, too,  which  she  had  casually 
said  a  day  or  two  ago  that  she  wanted, 
what  was  it?  Ah,  yes,  a  new  blotting- 
book  for  her  writing-table  in  the 
drawing-room.  The  shop  she  habitu- 
ally dealt  at  for  such  things,  a  branch 
of  Asprey's,  was  only  a  few  yards 
farther  on,  and  he  turned  in  to  make 
inquiries  as  to  whether  she  had 
ordered  it.  It  appeared  that  she  had 
been  in  that  very  morning,  but  the 
parcel  had  not  been  sent  yet.  So 
Morris,  taking  the  responsibility  on 
himself,  counterordered  the  plain  red 
morocco  book  she  had  chosen,  and 
chose  another,  with  fine  silver  scroll- 
work at  the  corners.  He  ordered,  too, 
that  a  silver  lettered  inscription  should 
be  put  on  it.  "  H.  A.  from  M.  A."  with 
the  date,  two  days  ahead,  "June  24th, 


96       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

1905."  Th  is  he  gave  instructions  should 
be  sent  to  the  house  on  the  morning 
of  June  24th,  the  day  after  to-morrow. 
He  wished  it  to  be  sent  so  as  to  arrive 
with  the  early  post  on  that  morning. 

The  promise  which  Morris  had  made 
his  old  friend  not  to  let  his  thoughts 
dwell  on  suspicion  and  conjecture  as 
yet  uncertain  of  foundation  was  one 
of  those  promises  which  are  made  in 
absolute  good  faith,  but  which  in 
their  very  nature  cannot  be  kept. 
The  thought  of  the  hideous  treachery, 
the  gratuitous  falsehood,  of  which,  in 
his  mind,  he  felt  convinced  Godfrey 
Mills  had  been  guilty  was  like  blood 
soaking  through  a  bandage.  All  that 
he  could  do  was  to  continue  putting 
on  fresh  bandages  —  that  was  all 
of  his  promise  that  he  was  able  to 
fulfill,  and  in  spite  of  the  bandages  the 
blood  stained  and  soaked  its  way 
through.     In   the   afternoon   he   took 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       97 

out  the  motor,  but  his  joy  in  it  for 
the  time  was  dead,  and  it  was  only 
because  in  the  sense  of  pace  and 
swift  movement  he  hoped  to  find  a 
narcotic  to  thought,  that  he  went 
out  at  all.  But  there  was  no  narcotic 
there,  nor  even  in  the  thought  of  this 
huge  joy  of  love  that  had  dawned  on 
him  was  there  forgetfulness  for  all 
else,  joy  and  sorrow  and  love,  were 
for  the  present  separated  from  him 
by  these  hideous  and  libellous  things 
that  had  been  said  about  him.  Until 
they  were  removed,  until  they  passed 
into  non-existence  again,  nothing  had 
any  significance  for  him.  Everything 
was  coloured  with  them;  bitterness  as 
of  blood  tinged  everything.  Hours, 
too,  must  pass  before  they  could  be 
removed;  this  long  midsummer  day 
had  to  draw  to  its  end,  night  had 
to  pass;  the  hour  of  early  dawn,  the 
long  morning  had  to  be  numbered 
with  the  past   before   he  could  even 


98       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

learn    who    was    responsible    for    this 
poisoned  tale. 

And  when  he  learned,  or  rather 
when  his  conjecture  was  confirmed  as 
to  who  it  was  (for  his  supposition  was 
conjecture  in  the  sense  that  it  only 
wanted  the  actual  seal  of  reality  on 
it)  what  should  he  do  next?  Or 
rather  what  must  he  do  next?  He 
felt  that  when  he  knew  absolutely  for 
certain  who  had  said  this  about  him, 
a  force  of  indignation  and  hatred, 
which  at  present  he  kept  chained  up, 
must  infallibly  break  its  chain,  and 
become  merely  a  wild  beast  let  loose. 
He  felt  he  would  be  no  longer  responsi- 
ble for  what  he  did,  something  had  to 
happen;  something  more  than  mere 
apology  or  retraction  of  words.  To 
lie  and  slander  like  that  was  a  crime, 
an  insult  against  human  and  divine 
justice.  It  would  be  nothing  for  the 
criminal  to  say  he  was  sorry;  he  had 
to  be  punished.     A  man  who  did  that 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       99 

was  not  fit  to  live;  he  was  a  man  no 
longer,  he  was  a  biting,  poisonous 
reptile,  who  for  the  sake  of  the  com- 
munity must  be  expunged.  Yet 
human  justice  which  hanged  people 
for  violent  crimes  committed  under 
great  provocation,  dealt  more  lightly 
with  this  far  more  devilish  thing, 
a  crime  committed  coldly  and  calculat- 
ingly, that  had  planned  not  the  mere 
death  of  his  body,  but  the  disgrace 
and  death  of  his  character.  Godfrey 
Mills— he  checked  the  word  and  added 
to  himself  "if  it  was  he' '  —  had  morally 
tried  to  kill  him. 

Morris,  after  his  interview  that  morn- 
ing with  Mr.  Taynton,  had  lunched 
alone  in  Sussex  Square,  his  mother 
having  gone  that  day  up  to  London 
for  two  nights.  His  plan  had  been  to 
go  up  with  her,  but  he  had  excused 
himself  on  the  plea  of  business  with 
his  trustees,  and  she  had  gone  alone. 
Directly  after  lunch  he  had  taken  the 


TOO     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

motor  out,  and  had  whirled  along  the 
coast  road,  past  Rottingdean  through 
Newhaven  and  Seaford,  and  ten  miles 
farther  until  the  suburbs  of  East- 
bourne had  begun.  There  he  turned, 
his  thoughts  still  running  a  mill-race 
in  his  head,  and  retracing  his  road  had 
by  now  come  back  to  within  a  mile  of 
Brighton  again.  The  sun  gilded  the 
smooth  channel,  the  winds  were  still, 
the  hot  midsummer  afternoon  lay 
hea\n,'  on  the  land.  Then  he  stopped 
the  motor  and  got  out,  telling  Martin 
to  wait  there. 

He  walked  over  the  strip  of  velvety 
dowTi  grass  to  the  edge  of  the  white 
cliffs,  and  there  sat  down.  The  sea 
below  him  whispered  and  crawled, 
above  the  sun  was  the  sole  tenant  of 
the  sky,  and  east  and  west  the  dowTi 
was  empty  of  passengers.  He,  like 
his  soul,  was  alone,  and  alone  he  had 
to  think  these  things  out. 

Yes,  this  liar  and  slanderer,  whoever 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     loi 

he  was,  had  tried  to  kill  him.  The 
attempt  had  been  well-planned  too, 
for  the  chances  had  been  a  thousand 
to  one  in  favour  of  the  murderer. 
But  the  one  chance  had  turned  up, 
Madge  had  loved  him,  and  she  had 
been  brave,  setting  at  defiance  the 
order  of  her  father,  and  had  seen  him 
secretly,  and  told  him  all  the  circum- 
stances of  this  attack  on  him.  But 
supposing  she  had  been  just  a  shade 
less  brave,  supposing  her  filial  obedi- 
ence had  weighed  an  ounce  heavier? 
Then  he  would  never  have  known 
anything  about  it.  The  result  would 
simply  have  been,  as  it  was  meant  to 
be,  that  the  Templetons  were  out 
when  he  called.  There  would  have 
been  a  change  of  subject  in  their 
rooms  when  his  name  was  mentioned, 
other  people  would  have  vaguely 
gathered  that  Mr.  Morris  Assheton's 
name  was  not  productive  of  animated 
conversation;   their  gatherings  would 


I02      THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

have  spread  further,  while  he  himself, 
ignorant  of  all  cause,  would  have 
encountered  cold  shoulders. 

Morris's  hands  clutched  at  the  short 
down  grass,  tearing  it  up  and  scatter- 
ing it.  He  was  helpless,  too,  unless 
he  took  the  law  into  his  own  hands. 
It  would  do  no  good,  young  as  he 
was,  he  knew  that,  to  bring  any 
action  for  defamation  of  character, 
since  the  world  only  says,  if  a  man 
justifies  himself  by  the  only  legal 
means  in  his  power,  "There  must  have 
been  something  in  it,  since  it  was 
said!"  No  legal  remedy,  no  fines  or, 
even  imprisonment,  far  less  apology 
and  retraction  satisfied  justice.  There 
were  only  two  courses  open:  one  to 
regard  the  slander  as  a  splash  of  mud 
thrown  by  some  vile  thing  that  sat  in 
the  gutter,  and  simply  ignore  it;  the 
other  to  do  something  himself,  to  strike, 
to  hit,  with  his  bodily  hands,  whatever 
the  result  of  his  violence  was. 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      103 

He  felt  his  shoulder-muscles  rise 
and  brace  themselves  at  the  thought, 
all  the  strength  and  violence  of  his 
young  manhood,  with  its  firm  sinews 
and  supple  joints,  told  him  that  it  was 
his  willing  and  active  servant  and 
would  do  his  pleasure.  He  wanted  to 
smash  the  jaw  bone  that  had  formed 
these  lies,  and  he  wanted  the  world 
to  know  he  had  done  so.  Yet  that 
was  not  enough,  he  wanted  to  throttle 
the  throat  from  which  the  words  had 
come;  the  man  ought  to  be  killed; 
it  was  right  to  kill  him  just  as  it  was 
right  to  kill  a  poisonous  snake  that 
somehow  disguised  itself  as  a  man,  and 
was  received  into  the  houses  of  men. 

Indeed,  should  Morris  be  told,  as 
he  felt  sure  he  would  be,  who  his 
slanderer  and  defamer  was,  that  gentle- 
man would  be  wise  to  keep  out  of  his 
way  with  him  in  such  a  mood.  There 
was  danger  and  death  abroad  on  this 
calm  hot  summer  afternoon. 


CHAPTER   V 

IT  WAS  about  four  o'clock  on  the 
afternoon  of  the  following  day,  and 
Mr.  Taynton  was  prolonging  his  hour 
of  quietude  after  lunch,  and  encroach- 
ing thereby  into  the  time  he  daily 
dedicated  to  exercise.  It  was  but  seldom 
that  he  broke  into  the  routine  of  habits 
so  long  formed,  and  indeed  the  most 
violent  rain  or  snow  of  winter,  the  most 
cutting  easterly  blasts  of  March,  never, 
unless  he  had  some  definite  bodily 
ailment,  kept  him  indoors  or  deprived 
him  of  his  brisk  health-giving  trudge 
over  the  downs  or  along  the  sea  front. 
But  occasionally  when  the  weather  was 
unusually  hot,  he  granted  himself  the 
indulgence  of  sitting  still  instead  of 
walking,  and  certainly  to-day  the  least 
lenient  judge  might  say  that  there 
104 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      105 

were  strong  extenuating  circumstances 
in  his  favour.  For  the  heat  of  the 
past  week  had  been  piling  itself  up, 
like  the  heaped  waters  of  flood  and  this 
afternoon  was  intense  in  its  heat,  its 
stillness  and  sultriness.  It  had  been 
sunless  all  day,  and  all  day  the  blanket 
of  clouds  that  beset  the  sky  had  been 
gathering  themselves  into  blacker  and 
more  ill-omened  density.  There  would 
certainly  be  a  thunderstorm  before 
morning,  and  the  approach  of  it  made 
Mr.  Taynton  feel  that  he  really  had  not 
the  energy  to  walk.  By  and  by  perhaps 
he  might  be  tempted  to  go  in  quest  of 
coolness  along  the  sea  front,  or  perhaps 
later  in  the  evening  he  might,  as  he 
sometimes  did,  take  a  carriage  up  on 
to  the  downs,  and  come  gently  home 
to  a  late  supper.  He  would  have 
time  for  that  to-day,  for  according  to 
arrangement  his  partner  was  to  drop 
in  about  half  past  nine  that  evening. 
If  he  got  back  at  nine,  supposing  he 


io6     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

went  at  all,  he  would  have  time  to  have 
some  food  before  receiving  him. 

He  sat  in  a  pleasant  parquetted  room 
looking  out  into  the  small  square 
garden  at  the  back  of  his  house 
in  Montpellier  Road.  Big  awnings 
stretched  from  the  window  over  the 
broad  gravel  path  outside,  and  in  spite 
of  the  excessive  heat  the  room  was 
full  of  dim  coolness.  There  was  but 
little  furniture  in  it,  and  it  presented 
the  strongest  possible  contrast  to  the 
appointments  of  his  partner's  flat  with 
its  heavy  decorations,  its  somewhat 
gross  luxury.  A  few  water-colours  hung 
on  the  white  walls,  a  few  Persian  rugs 
strewed  the  floor,  a  big  bookcase 
with  china  on  the  top  filled  one  end 
of  the  room,  his  writing-table,  a  half 
dozen  of  Chippendale  chairs,  and  the 
chintz-covered  sofa  where  he  now  lay 
practically  completed  the  inventory 
of  the  room.  Three  or  four  bronzes, 
a  Narcissus,  a  fifteenth-century  Italian 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      107 

St.  Francis,  and  a  couple  of  Greek 
reproductions  stood  on  the  chimney- 
piece,  but  the  whole  room  breathed  an 
atmosphere  of  aesthetic  asceticism. 

Since  lunch  Mr.  Taynton  had  glanced 
at  the  paper,  and  also  looked  up  the 
trains  from  Lewes  in  order  to  assure 
himself  that  he  need  not  expect  his 
partner  till  half  past  nine,  and  since 
then,  though  his  hands  and  his  eyes 
had  been  idle,  his  mind  had  been  very 
busy.  Yet  for  all  its  business,  he  had 
not  arrived  at  much.  Morris,  Godfrey 
Mills,  and  himself;  he  had  placed  these 
three  figures  in  all  sorts  of  positions 
in  his  mind,  and  yet  every  combination 
of  them  was  somehow  terrible  and 
menacing.  Try  as  he  would  he  could 
not  construct  a  peaceful  or  secure 
arrangement  of  them.  In  whatever 
way  he  grouped  them  there  was 
danger. 

The  kitchen  passage  ran  out  at 
right  angles  to  the  room  in  which  he 


io8     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

sat,  and  formed  one  side  of  the  garden. 
The  windows  in  it  were  high  up,  so 
that  it  did  not  overlook  the  flower- 
beds, and  on  this  torrid  afternoon 
they  were  all  fully  open.  Suddenly 
from  just  inside  came  the  fierce  clang- 
ing peal  of  a  bell,  which  made  him 
start  from  his  recumbent  position. 
It  was  the  front-door  bell,  as  he  knew, 
and  as  it  continued  ringing  as  if  a 
maniac's  grip  was  on  the  handle,  he 
heard  the  steps  of  his  servant  running 
along  the  stone  floor  of  the  passage 
to  see  what  imperative  summons  this 
was.  Then,  as  the  front  door  was 
opened,  the  bell  ceased  as  suddenly 
as  it  had  begun,  and  the  moment 
afterward  he  heard  Morris's  voice 
shrill  and  commanding. 

"  But  he  has  got  to  see  me,"  he  cried, 
"What  's  the  use  of  you  going  to  ask 
if  he  will?" 

Mr.  Taynton  went  to  the  door  of 
his  room  which  opened  into  the  hall. 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     109 

"Come  in,  Morris,"  he  said. 

Though  it  had  been  Morris's  hand 
which  had  raised  so  uncontrolled  a 
clamour,  and  his  voice  that  just  now- 
had  been  so  uncontrolled,  there  was 
no  sign,  when  the  door  of  Mr.  Taynton's 
room  had  closed  behind  them,  that 
there  was  any  excitement  of  any  sort 
raging  within  him.  He  sat  down  at 
once  in  a  chair  opposite  the  window, 
and  Mr.  Taynton  saw  that  in  spite  of 
the  heat  of  the  day  and  the  violence  of 
that  storm  which  he  knew  was  yelling 
and  screaming  through  his  brain,  his 
face  was  absolutely  white.  He  sat  with 
his  hands  on  the  arms  of  the  Chippen- 
dale chair,  and  they  too  were  quite  still. 

"I  have  seen  Sir  Richard,"  said  he, 
"and  I  came  back  at  once  to  see  you. 
He  has  told  me  everything.  Godfrey 
Mills  has  been  lying  about  me  and 
slandering  me." 

Mr.  Taynton  sat  down  heavily  on 
the  sofa. 


no      T?IE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

"No,  no;  don't  say  it,  don't  say  it," 
he  munnured.  "It  can't  be  true,  I 
can't  believe  it." 

"But  it  is  true,  and  you  have  got 
to  believe  it.  He  suggested  that  you 
should  go  and  talk  it  over  with  him. 
I  will  drive  you  up  in  the  car,  if  you 
wish  — —  " 

Mr.  Taynton  waved  his  hand  with 
a  negative  gesture. 

"No,  no,  not  at  once,"  he  cried. 
"I  must  think  it  over.  I  must  get 
used  to  this  dreadful,  this  appalling 
shock.     I  am  utterly  distraught." 

Morris  turned  to  him,  and  across 
his  face  for  one  moment  there  shot, 
swift  as  a  lightning-flash,  a  quiver  of 
rage  so  rabid  that  he  looked  scarcely 
human,  but  like  some  Greek  present- 
ment of  the  Furies  or  Revenge. 
Never,  so  thought  his  old  friend,  had 
he  seen  such  glorious  youthful  beauty 
so  instinct  and  inspired  with  hate.  It 
was  the  demoniacal  force  of  that  which 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     iii 

lent  such  splendour  to  it.  But  it 
passed  in  a  second,  and  Morris  still 
very  pale,  very  quiet  spoke  to  him. 

"Where  is  he?"  he  asked.  "I  must 
see  him  at  once.     It  won't   keep." 

Then  he  sprang  up,  his  rage  again 
mastering  him. 

''What  shall  I  do  it  with?"  he  said. 
"What  shall  I  do  it  with?" 

For  the  moment  Mr.  Taynton  forgot 
himself  and  his  anxieties. 

"Morris,  you  don't  know  what  you 
are  saying,"  he  cried.  "Thank  God 
nobody  but  me  heard  you  say  that!" 

Morris  seemed  not  to  be  attending. 

"Where  is  he?"  he  said  again, 
"are  you  concealing  him  here.  I  have 
already  been  to  your  office,  and  he 
wasn't  there,  and  to  his  fiat,  and  he 
wasn't  there." 

"Thank  God,"  ejaculated  the  lawyer. 

"By  all  means  if  you  like.  But 
I  've  got  to  see  him,  you  know.  Where 
is  he?" 


112      THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

"He  is  away  in  town,"  said  Mr. 
Taynton,  "but  he  will  be  back  to-night. 
Now  attend.  Of  course  you  must  see 
him,  I  quite  understand  that.  But 
you  must  n't  see  him  alone,  while 
you  are  like  this." 

"No,  I  don't  want  to,"  said  Morris. 
"  I  should  like  other  people  to  see  what 
I  *ve  got  to  —  to  say  to  him  —  that, 
that  partner  of  yours." 

"He  has  from  this  moment  ceased 
to  be  my  partner,"  said  Mr.  Taynton 
brokenly.  "I  could  never  again  sign 
what  he  has  signed,  or  work  with  him, 
or  —  or  —  except  once  —  see  him 
again.  He  is  coming  here  by  appoint- 
ment at  half-past  nine.  Suppose  that 
we  all  meet  here.  We  have  both  got 
to  see  him." 

Morris  nodded  and  went  toward 
the  door.  A  sudden  spasm  of  anxiety 
seemed  to  seize  Mr.  Taynton. 

"What  are  you  going  to  do  now?" 
he  asked. 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      113 

"I  don't  know.  Drive  to  Falmer 
Park  perhaps,  and  tell  Sir  Richard 
you  cannot  see  him  immediately.  Will 
you  see  him  to-morrow?" 

"Yes,  I  will  call  to-morrow  morning- 
Morris,  promise  me  you  will  do  nothing 
rash,  nothing  that  will  bring  sorrow  on 
all  those  who  love  you." 

"I  shall  bring  a  little  sorrow  on  a 
man  who  hates  me,"  said  he. 

He  went  out,  and  Mr.  Taynton  sat 
down  again,  his  mouth  compressed 
into  hard  lines,  his  forehead  heavily 
frowning.  He  could  not  permanently 
prevent  Morris  from  meeting  Godfrey 
Mills,  besides,  it  was  his  right  to  do  so, 
yet  how  fraught  with  awful  risks  to 
himself  that  meeting  would  be !  Morris 
might  easily  make  a  violent,  even  a 
murderous,  assault  on  the  man,  but 
Mills  was  an  expert  boxer  and  wrestler, 
science  would  probably  get  the  upper 
hand  of  blind  rage.  But  how  deadly 
a  weapon  Mills  had  in  store  against 


114     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

himself;  he  would  certainly  tell  Morris 
that  if  one  partner  had  slandered  him 
the  other,  whom  he  so  trusted  and 
revered,  had  robbed  him;  he  would 
say,  too,  that  Taynton  had  been  cogniz- 
ant of,  and  had  approved,  his  slanders. 
There  was  no  end  to  the  ruin  that 
would  certainly  be  brought  about  his 
head  if  they  met.  Mills's  train,  too, 
would  have  left  London  by  now;  there 
was  no  chance  of  stopping  him.  Then 
there  was  another  danger  he  had  not 
foreseen,  and  it  was  too  late  to  stop 
that  now.  Morris  was  going  again  to 
Falmer  Park,  had  indeed  started,  and 
that  afternoon  Godfrey  Mills  would 
get  out  of  the  train,  as  he  had  planned, 
at  the  station  just  below,  and  w^alk 
back  over  the  downs  to  Brighton. 
What  if  they  met  there,  alone?" 

For  an  hour  perhaps  Mr.  Taynton 
delved  at  these  problems,  and  at  the 
end  even  it  did  not  seem  as  if  he 
had    solved    them    satisfactorily,   for 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     115 

when  he  went  out  of  his  house,  as  he 
did  at  the  end  of  this  time  to  get  a 
little  breeze  if  such  was  obtainable, 
his  face  was  still  shadowed  and  over- 
clouded. Overclouded  too  was  the 
sky,  and  as  he  stepped  out  into  the 
street  from  his  garden-room  the  hot 
air  struck  him  like  a  buffet;  and  in  his 
troubled  and  apprehensive  mood  it 
felt  as  if  some  hot  hand  warned  him 
by  a  blow  not  to  venture  out  of  his 
house.  But  the  house,  somehow,  in 
the  last  hour  had  become  terrible  to 
him,  any  movement  or  action,  even  on 
a  day  like  this,  when  only  madmen 
and  the  English  go  abroad,  was  better 
than  the  nervous  waiting  in  his  dark- 
ened room.  Dreadful  forces,  forces  of 
ruin  and  murder  and  disgrace,  were 
abroad  in  the  world  of  men;  the  menace 
of  the  low  black  clouds  and  stifling 
heat  was  more  bearable.  He  wanted 
to  get  away  from  his  house,  which  was 
permeated  and  soaked  in  association 


ii6     THE  BLOTTIXG  BOOK 

with  the  other  two  actors,  who  in 
company  with  himself,  had  surely 
some  tragedy  for  which  the  curtain 
was  already  rung  up.  Some  dreadful 
scene  was  already  prepared  for  them; 
the  setting  and  stage  were  ready,  the 
prompter,  and  who  was  he?  was  in  the 
box  ready  to  tell  them  the  next  line 
if  any  of  them  faltered.  The  promp- 
ter, surely  he  was  destiny,  fate,  the 
irresistible  course  of  events,  with  which 
no  man  can  struggle,  any  more  than 
the  actor  can  struggle  with  or  alter 
the  lines  that  are  set  down  for  him. 
He  may  mumble  them,  he  may  act 
dispiritedly  and  tamely,  but  he  has 
undertaken  a  certain  part;  he  has  to 
go  through  with  it. 

Though  it  was  a  populous  hour  of  the 
day,  there  were  but  few  people  abroad 
when  Mr.  Taynton  came  out  to  the  sea 
front;  a  few  cabs  stood  by  the  railings 
that  bounded  the  broad  asphalt  path 
which  faced  the  sea,  but  the  drivers 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     117 

of  these,  despairing  of  fares,  were 
for  the  most  part  dozing  on  the  boxes, 
or  with  a  more  set  purpose  were 
frankly  slumbering  in  the  interior. 
The  dismal  little  wooden  shelters  that 
punctuated  the  parade  were  deserted, 
the  pier  stretched  an  untenanted  length 
of  boards  over  the  still,  lead-coloured 
sea,  and  it  seemed  as  if  nature  herself 
was  waiting  for  some  elemental 
catastrophe. 

And  though  the  afternoon  was  of 
such  hideous  and  sultry  heat,  Mr. 
Ta3mton,  though  he  walked  somewhat 
more  briskly  than  his  wont,  was  con- 
scious of  no  genial  heat  that  produced 
perspiration,  and  the  natural  reaction 
and  cooling  of  the  skin.  Some  internal 
excitement  and  fever  of  the  brain  cut 
off  all  external  things;  the  loneliness, 
the  want  of  correspondence  that  fever 
brings  between  external  and  internal 
conditions,  was  on  him.  At  one 
moment,    in    spite    of    the    heat,    he 


ii8      THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

shivered,   at  another  he  felt  that  an 
apoplexy  must  strike  him. 

For  some  half  hour  he  walked  to 
and  fro  along  the  sea-wall,  between 
the  blackness  of  the  sky  and  the 
lead -coloured  water,  and  then  his 
thoughts  turned  to  the  downs  above 
this  stricken  place,  where,  even  in  the 
sultriest  days  some  breath  of  wind 
was  always  moving.  Just  opposite 
him,  on  the  other  side  of  the  road,  was 
the  street  that  led  steeply  upward 
to  the  station.     He  went  up  it. 

It  was  about  half -past  seven  o'clock 
that  evening  that  the  storm  burst. 
A  few  huge  drops  of  rain  fell  on  the 
hot  pavements,  then  the  rain  ceased 
again,  and  the  big  splashes  dried,  as 
if  the  stones  had  been  blotting  paper 
that  sucked  the  moisture  in.  Then 
without  other  warning  a  streamer  of 
fire  split  the  steeple  of  St.  Agnes 's 
Church,   just  opposite  Mr.  Taynton's 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      119 

house,  and  the  crash  of  thunder 
answered  it  more  quickly  than  his 
servant  had  run  to  open  the  door 
to  Morris's  furious  ringing  of  the  bell. 
At  that  the  sluices  of  heaven  were 
opened,  and  heaven's  artillery  thun- 
dered its  salvoes  to  the  flare  of  the 
reckless  storm.  In  the  next  half- 
hour  a  dozen  houses  in  Brighton  were 
struck,  while  the  choked  gutters  over- 
flowing on  to  the  streets  made  ravines 
and  waterways  down  the  roadways. 
Then  the  thunder  and  lightning  ceased, 
but  the  rain  still  poured  down  relent- 
lessly and  windlessly,  a  flood  of 
perpendicular  water. 

Mr.  Taynton  had  gone  out  without 
umbrella,  and  when  he  let  himself  in 
by  his  latch-key  at  his  own  house- 
door  about  half-past  eight,  it  was  no 
wonder  that  he  wrung  out  his  coat 
and  trousers  so  that  he  should  not 
soak  his  Persian  rugs.  But  from  him, 
as  from  the  charged  skies,  some  tension 


I20     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

had  passed;  this  tempest  which  had 
so  cooled  the  air  and  restored  the 
equihbrium  of  its  forces  had  smoothed 
the  frowning  creases  of  his  brow,  and 
when  the  servant  hurried  up  at  the 
sound  of  the  banged  front-door,  he 
found  his  master  soaked  indeed,  but 
serene. 

"Yes,  I  got  caught  by  the  storm, 
WiUiams,"  he  said,  "and  I  am 
drenched.  The  hghtning  was  terrific, 
was  it  not?  I  will  just  change,  and 
have  a  little  supper;  some  cold  meat, 
anything  that  there  is.  Yes,  you 
might  take  my  coat  at  once." 

He  divested  himself  of  this. 

"And  I  expect  Mr.  Morris  this 
evening,"  he  said.  "He  will  probably 
have  dined,  but  if  not  I  am  sure  Mrs. 
Otter  will  toss  up  a  hot  dish  for  him. 
Oh,  yes,  and  Mr.  Mills  will  be  here  at 
half-past  nine,  or  even  sooner,  as  I 
cannot  think  he  will  have  walked  from 
Falmer  as  he  intended.     But  whenever 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     121 

he  comes,  I  will  see  him.  He  has  not 
been  here  already?" 

"  No,  sir , "  said  Williams,  ' '  Will  you 
have  a  hot  bath,  sir?" 

' '  No,  I  will  just  change.  How  bat- 
tered the  poor  garden  will  look  to- 
morrow after  this  deluge." 

Mr.  Taynton  changed  his  wet  clothes 
and  half  an  hour  afterwards  he  sat 
down  to  his  simple  and  excellent 
supper.  Mrs.  Otter  had  provided  an 
admirable  vegetable  soup  for  him, 
and  some  cold  lamb  with  asparagus 
and  endive  salad .  A  macedoine  of  straw- 
berries followed  and  a  scoop  of  cheese. 
Simple  as  his  fare  was,  it  just  suited 
Mr.  Taynton's  tastes,  and  he  was  in- 
dulging himself  with  the  rather  rare 
luxury  of  a  third  glass  of  port  when 
Williams  entered  again. 

"Mr.  Assheton,"  he  said,  and  held 
the  door  open. 

Morris  came  in;  he  was  dressed  in 


122      THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

evening  clothes  with  a  dinner  jacket,  and 
gave  no  salutation  to  his  host. 

"He  's  not  come  yet?"  he  asked. 

But  his  host  sprang  up. 

"Dear  boy,"  he  said,  "what  a  relief 
it  is  to  see  you.  Ever  since  you  left 
this  afternoon  I  have  had  you  on  my 
mind.     You  will  have  a  glass  of  port  ?" 

Morris  laughed,  a  curious  jangling 
laugh. 

"Oh  yes,  to  drink  his  health,"  he 
said. 

He  sat  down  with  a  jerk,  and  leaned 
his  elbows  on  the  table. 

"He  '11  want  a  lot  of  health  to  carry 
him  through  this,  won't  he?"  he  asked. 

He  drank  his  glass  of  port  like  water, 
and  Mr.  Taynton  instantly  filled  it  up 
again  for  him. 

"Ah,  I  remember  you  don't  like 
port,"  he  said.  "What  else  can  I 
offer  you?" 

"Oh,  this  vj'iW  do  very  well,"  said 
Morris.     "I  am  so  thirsty." 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     123 

"You  have  dined?"  asked  his  host 
quietly. 

"No;  I  don't  think  I  did.  I  was  n't 
hungry." 

The  Cromwelhan  clock  chimed  a 
remnant  half  hour. 

"Half-past,"  said  Morris,  filling  his 
glass  again.  "You  expect  him  then, 
don't  you?" 

"Mills  is  not  always  very  punctual," 
said  Mr.  Taynton. 

For  the  next  quarter  of  an  hour  the 
two  sat  with  hardly  the  interchange  of 
a  word.  From  outside  came  the  swift 
steady  hiss  of  the  rain  on  to  the  shrubs 
in  the  garden,  and  again  the  clock 
chimed.  Morris  who  at  first  had  sat  very 
quiet  had  begun  to  fidget  and  stir  in  his 
chair;  occasionally  when  he  happened 
to  notice  it,  he  drank  off  the  port  with 
which  Mr.  Taynton  hospitably  kept 
his  glass  supplied.  Sometimes  he  relit 
a  cigarette  only  to  let  it  go  out  again. 
But  when  the  clock  struck  he  got  up. 


124     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

' '  I  wonder  what  has  happened , "  he 
said.  "Can  he  have  missed  his  train? 
What  time  ought  he  to  have  got  in?" 

"He  was  to  have  got  to  Fahner," 
said  Mr.  Taynton  with  a  Httle  emphasis 
on  the  last  word,  "at  a  quarter  to  seven. 
He    spoke    of    walking   from    there." 

Morris  looked  at  him  with  a  furtive 
sidelong  glance. 

"Why,  I  —  I  might  have  met  him 
there, ' '  he  said.  ' '  I  went  up  there  again 
after  I  left  you  to  tell  Sir  Richard  you 
would  call  to-morrow." 

"You  saw  nothing  of  him?"  asked 
the  lawyer. 

"No,  of  course  not.  Otherwise  — 
There  was  scarcely  a  soul  on  the  road; 
the  storm  was  coming  up.  But  he 
would  go  by  the  downs,  would  he  not?" 

"The  path  over  the  downs  doesn't 
branch  off  for  a  quarter  of  a  mile  below 
Falmer  station,"  said  Mr.  Taynton. 

The  minutes  ticked  on  till  ten. 
Then  Morris  went  to  the  door. 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     125 

"I  shall  go  round  to  his  rooms  to 
see  if  he  is  there,"  he  said. 

"There  is  no  need,"  said  his  host, 
"I  will  telephone." 

The  instrument  hung  in  a  comer 
of  the  room,  and  with  very  little  delay, 
Mills's  servant  was  rung  up.  His 
master  had  not  yet  returned,  but  he 
had  said  that  he  should  very  likely 
be  late. 

"And  he  made  an  appointment  with 
you  for  half -past  nine?"  asked  Morris 
again. 

"Yes.  I  cannot  think  what  has 
happened  to  detain  him." 

Morris  went  quickly  to  the  door 
again. 

"I  believe  it  is  all  a  trick,"  he  said, 
"and  you  don't  want  me  to  meet  him. 
I  believe  he  is  in  his  rooms  the  whole 
time.     I  shall  go  and  see." 

Before  Mr.  Taynton  could  stop  him  he 
had  opened  the  front-door  and  banged 
it  behind  him,  and  was  off  hatless  and 


126      THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

coatless  through  the  pouring  per- 
pendicular rain. 

Mr.  Taynton  ran  to  the  door,  as 
if  to  stop  him,  but  Morris  was  already- 
halfway  down  the  street,  and  he  went 
upstairs  to  the  drawing-room.  Morris 
was  altogether  unlike  himself;  this 
discovery  of  Mills's  treachery  seemed 
to  have  changed  his  nature.  Violent 
and  quick  he  always  was,  but  to-night 
he  was  suspicious,  he  seemed  to  dis- 
trust Mr.  Taynton  himself.  And,  a 
thing  which  his  host  had  never  known 
him  do  before,  he  had  drunk  in  that 
half  hour  when  they  sat  waiting,  close 
on  a  bottle  of  port. 

The  evening  paper  lay  ready  cut 
for  him  in  its  accustomed  place,  but 
for  some  five  minutes  Mr.  Taynton 
did  not  appear  to  notice  it,  though 
evening  papers,  on  the  money-market 
page,  might  contain  news  so  frightfully 
momentous  to  him.  But  something, 
this  strangeness  in  Morris,  no  doubt, 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      127 

and  his  general  anxiety  and  suspense 
as  to  how  this  dreadful  knot  could 
unravel  itself,  preoccupied  him  now, 
and  even  when  he  did  take  up  the 
paper  and  turn  to  the  reports  of  Stock 
Exchange  dealings,  he  was  conscious 
of  no  more  than  a  sort  of  subaqueous 
thrill  of  satisfaction.  For  Boston  Cop- 
per had  gone  up  nearly  a  point  since 
the  closing  price  of  last  night. 

It  was  not  many  minutes,  however 
before  Morris  returned  with  matted  and 
streaming  hair  and   drenched  clothes. 

"He  has  not  come  back,"  he  said. 
' '  I  went  to  his  rooms  and  satisfied 
myself  of  that,  though  I  think  they 
thought  I  was  mad.  I  searched  them 
you  understand;  I  insisted.  I  shall  go 
round  there  again  first  thing  to-morrow 
morning,  and  if  he  is  not  there,  I  shall 
go  up  to  find  him  in  town.  I  can't  wait; 
I  simply  can't  wait." 

Mr.  Taynton  looked  at  him  gravely, 
then  nodded. 


128     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

"No,  I  guess  how  you  are  feeling," 
he  said,  "I  cannot  understand  what 
has  happened  to  Mills;  I  hope  nothing 
is  wTong.  And  now,  my  dear  boy, 
let  me  implore  you  to  go  straight  home, 
get  ofF  your  wet  things  and  go  to  bed. 
You  will  pay  heavily  for  your  excite- 
ment, if  you  are  not  careful." 

"I  '11  get  it  out  of  him."  said  Morris. 


CHAPTER  VI 

MORRIS,  as  Mr.  Taynton  had 
advised,  though  not  because 
he  advised  it,  had  gone  straight  home 
to  the  house  in  Sussex  Square,  had 
stripped  off  his  dripping  clothes,  and 
then,  since  this  was  the  line  of  least 
resistance,  had  gone  to  bed.  He  did 
not  feel  tired,  and  he  longed  with  that 
aching  longing  of  the  son  for  the 
mother,  that  Mrs.  Assheton  had  been 
here,  so  that  he  could  just  be  in  her 
presence,  and,  if  he  found  himself 
unable  to  speak  and  tell  her  all  the 
hideous  happenings  of  those  last  days, 
let  her  presence  bring  a  sort  of  healing 
to  his  tortxired  mind.  But  though 
he  was  conscious  of  no  tiredness,  he 
was  tired  to  the  point  of  exhaustion, 
and  he  had  hardly  got  into  bed,  when 
129 


130     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

he  fell  fast  asleep.  Outside,  hushing 
him  to  rest,  there  sounded  the  sibilant 
rain,  and  from  the  sea  below  ripples 
broke  gently  and  rhythmically  on  the 
pebbly  beach.  Nature,  too,  it  seemed, 
was  exhausted  by  that  convulsion  of 
the  elements  that  had  turned  the  even- 
ing into  a  clamorous  hell  of  fire  and 
riot,  and  now  from  very  weariness  she 
was  weeping  herself  asleep. 

It  was  not  yet  eleven  when  Morris 
had  got  home,  and  he  slept  dreamlessly 
with  that  recuperative  sleep  of  youth 
for  some  six  hours.  Then,  as  within 
the  secret  economy  of  the  brain 
the  refreshment  of  slumber  repaired 
the  exhaustion  of  the  day  before,  he 
began  to  dream  with  strange  lurid 
distinctness,  a  sort  of  resurrection 
dream  of  which  the  events  of  the  two 
days  before  supplied  the  bones  and 
skeleton  outline.  As  in  all  ver}'  vivid 
and  dreadful  dreams  the  whole  vision 
was  connected  and  coherent,  there  were 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      131 

no  ludicrous  and  inconsequent  inter- 
ludes, none  of  those  breakings  of  one 
thread  and  hurried  seizures  of  another, 
which  though  one  is  dreaming  very 
distinctly,  supply  some  vague  mental 
comfort,  since  even  to  the  sleeper 
they  are  reminders  that  his  experiences 
are  not  solid  but  mere  phantasies 
woven  by  imperfect  consciousness  and 
incomplete  control  of  thought.  It  was 
not  thus  that  Morris  dreamed;  his 
dream  was  of  the  solid  and  sober 
texture  of  life. 

He  was  driving  in  his  motor,  he 
thought,  down  the  road  from  the  house 
at  Falmer  Park,  which  through  the 
gate  of  a  disused  lodge  joins  the  main 
road,  that  leads  from  Falmer  Station 
to  Brighton.  He  had  just  heard  from 
Sir  Richard's  own  lips  who  it  was  who 
had  slandered  and  blackened  him,  but, 
in  his  dream,  he  was  conscious  of  no 
anger.  The  case  had  been  referred  to 
some  higher  power,  some  august  court 


132      THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

of  supreme  authority,  which  would 
certainly  use  its  own  instruments  for 
its  own  vengeance.  He  felt  he  was 
concerned  in  the  affair  no  longer;  he 
was  but  a  spectator  of  what  would  be. 
And,  in  obedience  to  some  inward  dic- 
tation, he  drove  his  motor  on  to  the 
grass  behind  the  lodge,  so  that  it  was 
concealed  from  the  road  outside,  and 
walked  along  the  inside  of  the  park- 
palings,  which  ran  parallel  with  it. 

The  afternoon,  it  seemed,  was  very 
dark,  though  the  atmosphere  was  ex- 
traordinarily clear,  and  after  walking 
along  the  spring\'  grass  inside  the  rail- 
ings for  some  three  hundred  yards, 
where  was  the  southeastern  comer  of 
the  park  enclosure,  he  stopped  at  the 
angle  and  standing  on  tip- toe  peered 
over  them,  for  they  were  nearly  six 
feet  high,  and  looked  into  the  road  be- 
low. It  ran  straight  as  a  billiard-cue 
just  here,  and  was  visible  for  a  long 
distance,  but  at  the  comer,  just  out- 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     133 

side  the  palings,  the  footpath  over  the 
downs  to  Brighton  left  the  road,  and 
struck  upward.  On  the  other  side 
of  the  road  ran  the  railway,  and  in 
this  clear  dark  air,  Morris  could  see 
with  great  distinctness  Falmer  Station 
some  four  hundred  yards  away,  a 
a  long  stretch  of  the  line  on  the  other 
side  of  it. 

As  he  looked  he  saw  a  puff  of  steam 
rise  against  the  woods  beyond  the 
station,  and  before  long  a  train,  going 
Brighton  ward,  clashed  into  the  sta- 
tion. Only  one  passenger  got  out, 
and  he  came  out  of  the  station  into 
the  road.  He  was  quite  recognisable 
even  at  this  distance.  In  his  dream 
Morris  felt  that  he  expected  to  see 
him  get  out  of  the  train,  and  walk 
along  the  road;  the  whole  thing  seemed 
pre-ordained.  But  he  ceased  tiptoeing 
to  look  over  the  paling;  he  could  hear 
the  passenger's  steps  when  he  came 
nearer. 


134     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

He  thought  he  waited  quietly,  squat- 
ting down  on  the  mossy  grass  behind 
the  pahng.  Something  in  his  hands 
seemed  angry,  fur  his  fingers  kept 
tearing  up  the  short  turf,  and  the 
juice  of  the  severed  stems  was  red  hke 
blood.  Then  in  the  gathering  darkness 
he  heard  the  tip-tap  of  footsteps  on 
the  highway.  But  it  never  occurred 
to  him  that  this  passenger  would 
continue  on  the  highroad;  he  was 
certainly  going  over  the  downs  to 
Brighton. 

The  air  was  quite  windless,  but  at 
this  moment  Morris  heard  the  boughs 
of  the  oak-tree  immediately  above 
him  stir  and  shake,  and  looking  up 
he  saw  Mr.Taynton  sitting  in  a  fork 
of  the  tree.  That,  too,  was  perfectly 
natural;  Mr.  Taynton  was  Mills's  part- 
ner; he  was  there  as  a  sort  of  umpire. 
He  held  a  glass  of  port  wine  in  one 
hand,  and  was  sipping  it  in  a  leisurely 
manner,  and  when    Morris  looked  up 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     135 

at  him,  he  smiled  at  him,  but  put  his 
finger  to  his  hps,  as  if  recommending 
silence.  And  as  the  steps  on  the  road 
outside  sounded  close  he  turned  a 
meaning  glance  in  the  direction  of  the 
road.  From  where  he  sat  high  in  the 
tree,  it  was  plain  to  Morris  that  he 
must  command  the  sight  of  the  road, 
and  was,  in  his  friendly  manner, 
directing    operations. 

Suddenly  the  sound  of  the  steps 
ceased,  and  Morris  wondered  for  the 
moment  whether  Mills  had  stopped. 
But  looking  up  again,  he  saw  Mr. 
Taynton's  head  twisted  round  to  the 
right,  still  looking  over  the  palings. 
But  Morris  found  at  once  that  the 
footsteps  were  noiseless,  not  because 
the  walker  had  paused,  but  because 
they  were  inaudible  on  the  grass.  He 
had  left  the  road,  as  the  dreamer  felt 
certain  he  would,  and  was  going  over 
the  downs  to  Brighton.  At  that  Mor- 
ris got  up,  and  still    inside  the  park, 


136     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

railings  followed  in  the  direction  he 
had  gone.  Then  for  the  first  time  in 
his  dream,  he  felt  angry,  and  the 
anger  grew  to  rage,  and  the  rage  to 
quivering  madness.  Next  moment  he 
had  vaulted  the  fence,  and  sprang 
upon  the  walker  from  behind.  He 
dealt  him  blows  with  some  hard  instru- 
ment, belabouring  his  head,  while 
with  his  left  hand  he  throttled  his 
throat  so  that  he  could  not  scream. 
Only  a  few  were  necessary,  for  he  knew 
that  each  blow  went  home,  since  all 
the  savage  youthful  strength  of  shoul- 
der and  loose  elbow  directed  them. 
Then  he  withdrew  his  left  hand  from 
the  throttled  throat  of  the  victim 
who  had  ceased  to  struggle,  and  like 
a  log  he  fell  back  on  to  the  grass,  and 
Morris  for  the  first  time  looked  on  his 
face.  It  was  not  Mills  at  all;  it  was 
Mr.  Taynton. 

The  terror  plucked   him   from   his 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     137 

sleep;  for  a  moment  he  wrestled  and 
struggled  to  raise  his  head  from  the 
pillow  and  loosen  the  clutch  of  the 
night-hag  who  had  suddenly  seized 
him,  and  with  choking  throat  and 
streaming  brow  he  sat  up  in  bed. 
Even  then  his  dream  was  more  real  to 
him  than  the  sight  of  his  own  familiar 
room,  more  real  than  the  touch  of 
sheet  and  blanket  or  the  dew  of 
anguish  which  his  own  hand  wiped 
from  his  forehead  and  throat.  Yet, 
what  was  his  dream?  Was  it  merely 
some  subconscious  stringing  together 
of  suggestions  and  desires  and  events 
vivified  in  sleep  to  a  coherent  story 
(all  but  that  recognition  of  Mr.  Taynton, 
which  was  nightmare  pure  and  simple) , 
or  had  it  happened? 

With  waking,  anyhow,  the  public 
life,  the  life  that  concerned  other 
living  folk  as  well  as  himself,  became 
predominant  again.  He  had  certainly 
seen  Sir  Richard  the  day  before,  and 


138     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

Sir  Richard  had  given  him  the  name 
of  the  man  who  had  slandered  him. 
He  had  gone  to  meet  that  man,  but 
he  had  not  kept  his  appointment,  nor 
had  he  come  back  to  his  flat  in 
Brighton.  So  to-day  he,  Morris,  was 
going  to  call  there  once  more,  and  if 
he  did  not  find  him,  was  going  to  drive 
up  to  London,  and  seek  him  there. 

But  he  had  been  effectually  plucked 
from  further  sleep,  sleep  had  been 
strangled,  and  he  got  out  of  bed  and 
went  to  the  window.  Nature,  in  any 
case,  had  swept  her  trouble  away,  and 
the  pure  sweet  morning  was  beginning 
to  dawn  in  lines  of  yellow  and  fleeces 
of  rosy  cloud  on  the  eastern  horizon. 

All  that  riot  and  hurly-burly  of 
thunder,  the  bull's  eye  flashing  of 
lightning,  the  perpendicular  rain  were 
things  of  the  past,  and  this  morning 
a  sky  of  pale  limpid  blue,  flecked 
only  by  the  thinnest  clouds,  stretched 
from  horizon  to  horizon.     Below  the 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      139 

mirror  of  the  sea  seemed  as  deep  and 
as  placid  as  the  sky  above  it,  and  the 
inimitable  freshness  of  the  dawn  spoke 
of  a  world  rejuvenated  and  renewed. 

It  was,  by  his  watch,  scarcely  five; 
in  an  hour  it  would  be  reasonable  to 
call  at  Mills's  flat,  and  see  if  he  had 
come  by  the  midnight  train.  If  not 
his  motor  could  be  round  by  soon  after 
six,  and  he  would  be  in  town  by  eight, 
before  Mills,  if  he  had  slept  there, 
would  be  thinking  of  starting  for 
Brighton.     He  was  sure  to  catch  him. 

Morris  had  drawn  up  the  blind,  and 
through  the  open  window  came  the 
cool  breath  of  the  morning  ruffling 
his  hair,  and  blowing  his  night-shirt 
close  to  his  skin,  and  just  for  that 
moment,  so  exquisite  was  this  feeling 
of  renewal  and  cleanness  in  the  hour 
of  dawn,  he  thought  with  a  sort  of 
incredulous  wonder  of  the  red  murder- 
ous hate  which  had  possessed  him  the 
evening  before.     He  seemed  to  have 


I40      THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

been  literally  beside  himself  with  anger 
and  his  words,  his  thoughts,  his  actions 
had  been  controlled  by  a  force  and  a 
possession  which  was  outside  himself. 
Also  the  dreadful  reality  of  his  dream 
still  a  little  unnerv^ed  him,  and  though 
he  w^as  himself  now  and  awake,  he 
felt  that  he  had  been  no  less  himself 
when  he  throttled  the  throat  of  that 
abhorred  figure  that  walked  up  the 
noiseless  path  over  the  downs  to 
Brighton,  and  with  vehement  and 
savage  blows  clubbed  it  down.  And 
then  the  shock  of  finding  it  was  his 
old  friend  whom  he  had  done  to 
death!  That,  it  is  true,  was  night- 
mare pure  and  simple,  but  all  the  rest 
was  clad  in  sober,  convincing  garb 
of  events  that  had  really  taken  place. 
He  could  not  at  once  separate  his 
dream  from  reality,  for  indeed  what 
had  he  done  yesterday  after  he  had 
learned  who  his  traducer  had  been? 
He  scarcely  knew;  all  events  and  facts 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      141 

seemed  colourless  compared  to  the 
rage  and  mad  lust  for  vengeance 
which  had  occupied  his  entire  con- 
sciousness. 

Thus,  as  he  dressed,  the  thoughts 
and  the  rage  of  yesterday  began  to 
stir  and  move  in  his  mind  again. 
His  hate  and  his  desire  that  justice 
should  be  done,  that  satisfaction  should 
be  granted  him,  was  still  in  his  heart. 
But  now  they  were  not  wild  and 
flashing  flames;  they  burned  with  a 
hard,  cold,  even  light.  They  were 
already  part  of  himself,  integral  pieces 
and  features  of  his  soul.  And  the 
calm  beauty  and  peace  of  the  morning 
ceased  to  touch  him,  he  had  a  stem 
piece  of  business  to  put  through  before 
he  could  think  of  anything  else. 

It  was  not  yet  six  when  he  arrived 
at  the  house  in  which  was  Mills's 
flat.  A  few  housemaids  were  about, 
but  the  lift  was  not  yet  working,  and 


142      THE  BLOrriNG  BOOK 

he  ran  upstairs  and  rang  at  the  bell. 
It  was  answered  almost  immediately, 
for  Mills's  servant  suj^posed  it  must  be 
his  master  arriving  at  this  early  hour, 
since  no  one  else  would  come  then, 
and  he  opened  the  door,  half  dressed, 
with  coat  and  trousers  only  put  over 
his  night  things. 

"Is  Mr.  Mills  back  yet?"  asked 
Morris. 

"No,  sir." 

Morris  turned  to  go,  but  then 
stopped,  his  mind  still  half-suspicious 
that  he  had  been  warned  by  his 
partner,  and  was  lying  perdu. 

"I  '11  give  you  another  ten  shillings," 
he  said,  "if  you  '11  let  me  come  in  and 
satisfy  myself." 

The  man  hesitated. 

"A  sovereign,"  said  Morris. 

He  went  back  to  Sussex  Square  after 
this,  roused  Martin,  ordering  him  to 
bring  the  motor  round  at  once,    and 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      143 

drank  a  cup  of  tea,  for  he  would  break- 
fast in  town.  His  mother  he  expected 
would  be  back  during  the  morning, 
and  at  the  thought  of  her  he  remem- 
bered that  this  was  June  24th,  her 
birthday,  and  that  his  present  to  her 
would  be  arriving  by  the  early  post. 
He  gave  orders,  therefore,  that  a  packet 
for  him  from  Asprey's  was  not  to  be 
unpacked,  but  given  to  her  on  her 
arrival  with  her  letters.  A  quarter 
of  an  hour  later  he  was  off,  leaving 
Martin  behind,  since  there  were  various 
businesses  in  the  town  which  he  wanted 
him  to  attend  to. 

Mr.  Taynton,  though  an  earlier  riser 
than  his  partner,  considered  that  half 
past  nine  was  soon  enough  to  begin 
the  day,  and  punctually  at  that  time  he 
came  downstairs  to  read,  as  his  custom 
was,  a  few  collects  and  some  short 
piece  of  the  Bible  to  his  servants, 
before    having    his    breakfast.     That 


144     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

little  ceremony  over  he  walked  for  a 
few  minutes  in  his  garden  while  Williams 
brought  in  his  toast  and  tea-urn,  and 
observed  that  though  the  flowers  would 
no  doubt  be  all  the  better  for  the 
liberal  watering  of  the  day  before, 
it  was  idle  to  deny  that  the  rain  had 
not  considerably  damaged  them.  But 
his  attention  was  turned  from  these 
things  to  Williams  who  told  him  that 
breakfast  was  ready,  and  also  brought 
him  a  telegram.  It  was  from  Morris, 
and  had  been  sent  off  from  the  Sloane 
Square  office  an  hour  before. 

Mills  is  not  in  town ;  they  say  he  left 
yesterday  afternoon.  Please  inform  me 
if  you  know  whether  this  is  so,  or  if  you 
are  keeping  him  from  me.  Am  delayed  by 
break-down.  Shall  be  back  about  five. — 
Morris,  Bachelors'  Club. 

Mr.  Taynton  read  this  through  twice, 
as  is  the  habit  of  most  people  with 
telegrams,  and  sent,  of  course,  the 
reply  that  all  he  knew  was  that  his 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      145 

partner  intended  to  come  back  last 
night,  since  he  had  made  an  appoint- 
ment with  him.  Should  he  arrive 
during  the  day  he  would  telegraph. 
He  himself  was  keeping  nothing  from 
Morris,  and  had  not  had  any  corre- 
spondence or  communication  with  his 
partner  since  he  had  left  Brighton  for 
town  three  days  before. 

The  telegram  was  a  long  one,  but 
Mr.  Taynton  still  sat  with  poised  pen. 
Then  he  added,  "Pray  do  nothing 
violent,  I  implore  you."  And  he 
signed  it. 

He  sat  rather  unusually  long  over 
his  breakfast  this  morning,  though  he 
ate  but  little,  and  from  the  cheerful 
smiling  aspect  of  his  face  it  would 
seem  that  his  thoughts  were  pleasant 
to  him.  He  was  certainly  glad  that 
Morris  had  not  yet  come  across  Mills, 
for  he  trusted  that  the  lapse  of  a  day 
or  two  would  speedily  calm  down  the 


146     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

lad's  perfectly  justifiable  indignation. 
Besides,  he  was  in  love,  and  his  suit 
had  prospered;  surely  there  were  pleas- 
anter  things  than  revenge  to  occupy 
him.  Then  his  face  grew  grave  a 
moment  as  he  thought  of  Morris's 
mad,  murderous  outburst  of  the  evening 
before,  but  that  gravity  was  short- 
lived, and  he  turned  with  a  sense  of 
pleasant  expectation  to  see  recorded 
again  the  activity  and  strength  of 
Boston  Coppers.  But  the  reality  was 
far  beyond  his  expectations;  copper 
had  been  strong  all  day,  and  in  the 
street  afterward  there  had  been  re- 
newed buying  from  quarters  which 
were  usually  well  informed.  Bostons 
had  been  much  in  request,  and  after 
hours  they  had  had  a  further  spurt, 
closing  at  £']  los.  Already  in  these 
three  days  he  had  cleared  his  option,  and 
at  present  prices  the  shares  showed  a 
profit  of  a  point.  Mills  w^ould  have  to 
acknowledge  that  his  perspicacity  had 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     147 

been  at  fault,  when  he  distrusted  this 
last  purchase. 

He  left  his  house  at  about  half -past 
ten,  and  again  immured  himself  in  the 
birdcage  lift  that  carried  him  up  to 
his  partner's  flat,  where  he  inquired 
if  he  had  yet  returned.  Learning  he 
had  not,  he  asked  to  be  given  pen 
and  paper,  to  write  a  note  for  him, 
which  was  to  be  given  to  him  on  his 
arrival. 

Dear  Mills, 

Mr.  Morris  Assheton  has  learned  that 
you  have  made  grave  accusations  about 
him  to  Sir  Richard  Templeton,  Bart. 
That  you  have  done  so  appears  to  be 
beyond  doubt,  and  it  of  course  rests  with 
you  to  substantiate  them.  I  cannot  of 
course  at  present  believe  that  you  could 
have  done  so  without  conclusive  evidence ; 
on  the  other  hand  I  cannot  believe  that 
Mr.  Assheton  is  of  the  character  which 
you  have  given  him. 

I  therefore  refrain,  as  far  as  I  am  able, 


148     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

from    drawing    any    conclusion    till    the 
matter  is  cleared  up. 

I  may  add  that  he  deeply  resents  your 
conduct;  his  anger  and  indignation  were 
terrible  to  see. 

Sincerely  yours, 

Edward  Taynton. 
Godfrey  Mills,  Esq. 

Mr.  Taynton  read  this  through,  and 
glanced  round,  as  if  to  see  whether  the 
servants  had  left  the  room.  Then  he 
sat  \vith  closed  eyes  for  a  moment, 
and  took  an  envelope,  and  swiftly 
addressed  it.  He  smudged  it,  however, 
in  blotting  it,  and  so  crumpled  it  up, 
threw  it  into  the  waste-paper  basket. 
He  then  addressed  a  second  one,  and 
into  this  he  inserted  his  letter,  and 
got  up. 

The  servant  was  waiting  in  the 
httle  hall  outside. 

"Please  give  this  to  Mr.  Mills  when 
he  arrives,"  he  said.  "You  expected 
him  last  night,  did  you  not?" 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     149 

Mr.  Taynton  found  on  arrival  at  his 
office  that,  in  his  partner's  absence, 
there  was  a  somewhat  heavy  day  of 
work  before  him,  and  foresaw  that 
he  would  be  occupied  all  afternoon 
and  indeed  probably  up  to  dinner 
time.  But  he  was  able  to  get  out 
for  an  hour  at  half-past  twelve,  at 
which  time,  if  the  weather  was  hot, 
he  generally  indulged  in  a  swim. 
But  to-day  there  was  a  certain  chill 
in  the  air  after  yesterday's  storm,  and 
instead  of  taking  his  dip,  he  walked 
along  the  sea  front  toward  Sussex 
Square.  For  in  his  warm-hearted  way, 
seeing  that  Morris  was,  as  he  had  said, 
to  tell  his  mother  to-day  about  his 
happy  and  thoroughly  suitable  love 
affair,  Mr.  Taynton  proposed  to  give 
a  little  partie  carree  on  the  earliest 
possible  evening,  at  which  the  two 
young  lovers,  Mrs.  Assheton,  and  him- 
self would  form  the  table.  He  would 
learn  from  her  what  was  the  earliest 


ISO     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

night  on  which  she  and  Morris  were 
disengaged,  and  then  write  to  that 
deUghtful  girl  whose  affections  dear 
Morris  had  captured. 

But  at  the  comer  of  the  square, 
just  as  he  was  turning  into  it,  there 
bowled  swiftly  out  a  victoria  drawn 
by  two  horses;  he  recognised  the 
equipage,  he  recognised  also  Mrs.  As- 
sheton  who  was  sitting  in  it.  Her 
head,  however,  was  turned  the  other 
way,  and  Mr.  Taynton's  hand,  already 
half-way  up  to  his  hat  was  spared  the 
trouble  of  journeying  farther. 

But  he  went  on  to  the  house,  since 
his  invitation  could  be  easily  conveyed 
by  a  note  which  he  would  scribble 
there,  and  was  admitted  by  Martin. 
Mrs.  Assheton,  however,  was  out,  a 
fact  which  he  learned  with  regret, 
but,  if  he  might  write  a  note  to  her, 
his  walk  would  not  be  wasted.  Ac- 
cordingly he  was  shown  up  into  the 
drawing-room,  where  on  the  writing- 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      151 

table  was  laid  an  open  blotting-book. 
Even  in  so  small  a  detail  as  a  blotting- 
book  the  careful  appointment  of  the 
house  was  evident,  for  the  blotting- 
paper  was  absolutely  clean  and  white, 
a  virgin  field. 

Mr.  Taynton  took  up  a  quill  pen, 
thought  over  for  a  moment  the  wording 
of  his  note  and  then  wrote  rapidly. 
A  single  side  of  notepaper  was  suffi- 
cient; he  blotted  it  on  the  pad,  and 
read  it  through.  But  something  in  it, 
it  must  be  supposed,  did  not  satisfy 
him,  for  he  crtimpled  it  up.  Ah,  at 
last  and  for  the  first  time  there  was  a 
flaw  in  the  appointment  of  the  house, 
for  there  was  no  waste-paper  basket  by 
the  table.  At  any  rate  one  must  suppose 
that  Mr.  Taynton  did  not  see  it,  for  he 
put  his  rejected  sheet  into  his  pocket. 

He  took  another  sheet  of  paper,  select- 
ing from  the  various  stationery  that 
stood  in  the  case  a  plain  piece,  reject- 
ing that  which  was  marked  with  the 


152     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

address  of  the  house,  wrote  his  own 
address  at  the  head,  and  proceeded 
for  the  second  time  to  write  his  note 
of  invitation. 

But  first  he  changed  the  quill  for  his 
own  stylograph,  and  wrote  with  that. 
This  was  soon  written,  and  by  the  time 
he  had  read  it  through  it  was  dry,  and 
d id  not  requ ire  to  be  bio t ted .  He  placed 
it  in  a  plain  envelope,  directed  it,  and 
with  it  in  his  hand  left  the  room,  and 
went  briskly  downstairs. 

Martin  was  standing  in  the  hall. 

"  I  want  this  given  to  Mrs.  Assheton 
when  she  comes  in,  Martin,"  he  said. 

He  looked  round,  as  he  had  done 
once  before  when  speaking  to  the  boy. 

"I  left  it  at  the  door,"  he  said  with 
quiet  emphasis.  "Can  you  remember 
that?  I  left  it.  i\nd  I  hope,  Martin, 
that  you  have  made  a  fresh  start,  and 
that  I  need  never  be  obliged  to  tell 
anybody  what  I  know  about  you. 
You  will  remember  my  instructions? 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      153 

I  left  this  at  the  door.  Thank  you. 
My  hat?     Yes,  and  my  stick." 

Mr.  Taynton  went  straight  back  to 
his  office,  and  though  this  morning 
there  had  seemed  to  him  to  be  a  good 
deal  of  work  to  be  got  through,  he 
found  that  much  of  it  could  be  delega- 
ted to  his  clerks.  So  before  leaving  to  go 
to  his  lunch,  he  called  in  Mr.  Timmins. 

"Mr.  Mills  not  been  here  all  morn- 
ing?" he  asked.  "No?  Well,  Tim- 
mins, there  is  this  packet  which  I 
want  him  to  look  at,  if  he  comes  in 
before  I  am  back.  I  shall  be  here 
again  by  five,  as  there  is  an  hour's 
work  for  me  to  do  before  evening. 
Yes,  that  is  all,  thanks.  Please  tell 
Mr.  Mills  I  shall  come  back,  as  I 
said.  How  pleasant  this  freshness  is 
after  the  rain.  The  'clear  shining 
after  rain.'  Wonderful  words!  Yes,  Mr. 
Timmins,  you  will  find  the  verse  in  the 
second  book  of  Samuel  and  the  twenty- 
third  chapter." 


CHAPTER    VII 

MR.TAYNTON  made  but  a  short 
meal  of  lunch,  and  ate  but 
sparingly,  for  he  meant  to  take  a 
good  walk  this  afternoon,  and  it  was 
not  yet  two  o'clock  when  he  came  out 
of  his  house  again,  stick  in  hand. 
It  was  a  large  heavy  stick  that  he 
carried,  a  veritable  club,  one  that  it 
would  be  easy  to  recognise  amid  a  host 
of  others,  even  as  he  had  recognised 
it  that  morning  in  the  rather  populous 
umbrella-stand  in  the  hall  of  Mrs. 
Assheton's  house.  He  had,  it  may  be 
remembered,  more  ofhce  work  to  get 
through  before  evening,  so  he  prepared 
to  walk  out  as  far  as  the  limits  of  the 
time  at  his  disposal  would  admit 
and  take  the  train  back.  And  since 
there  could  be  nothing  more  pleasur- 
154 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      155 

able  in  the  way  of  walking  than 
locomotion  over  the  springy  grass  of 
the  downs,  he  took,  as  he  had  done  a 
hundred  times  before,  the  road  that 
led  to  Falmer.  A  hundred  yards  out 
of  Brighton  there  was  a  stile  by  the 
roadside;  from  there  a  footpath,  if  it 
could  be  dignified  by  the  name  of 
path  at  all,  led  over  the  hills  to  a 
comer  of  Falmer  Park.  From  there 
three  or  four  hundred  yards  of  high- 
way would  bring  him  to  the  station. 
He  would  be  in  good  time  to  catch  the 
4.30  train  back,  and  would  thus  be 
at  his  office  again  for  an  hour's  work 
at  five. 

His  walk  was  solitary  and  unevent- 
ful, but,  to  one  of  so  delicate  and 
sensitive  a  mind,  full  of  tiny  but 
memorable  sights  and  sounds.  Up 
on  these  high  lands  there  was  a  con- 
siderable breeze,  and  Mr.  Taynton 
paused  for  a  minute  or  two  beside  a 
windmill    that    stood    alone,    in    the 


156     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

expanse  of  down,  watching,  with  a 
sort  of  boyish  wonder,  the  huge  flails 
swing  down  and  aspire  again  in  the 
circles  of  their  tireless,  toil.  A  little 
farther  on  was  a  grass-grown  tumulus 
of  Saxon  times,  and  his  mind  was 
distracted  from  the  present  to  those 
early  days  when  the  unknown  dead 
was  committed  to  this  wind-swept 
tomb.  Forests  of  pine  no  doubt  then 
grew  around  his  resting  place,  it  was 
beneath  the  gloom  and  murmur  of 
their  sable  foliage  that  this  dead  chief 
was  entrusted  to  the  keeping  of  the 
kindly  earth.  He  passed,  too,  over 
the  lines  of  a  Roman  camp;  once  this 
sunny  empty  down  re-echoed  to  the 
clang  of  arms, the  voices  of  the  living 
were  mingled  with  the  cries  and  groans 
of  the  dying,  for  without  doubt  this 
stronghold  of  Roman  arms  was  not 
won,  standing,  as  it  did,  on  the  top- 
most commanding  slope  of  the  hills, 
without    slaughter.     Yet    to-day    the 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      157 

peaceful  clumps  of  cistus  and  the 
trembling  harebell  blossomed  on  the 
battlefield. 

From  this  point  the  ground  declined 
swiftly  to  the  main  road.  Straight  in 
front  of  him  were  the  palings  of 
Falmer  Park,  and  the  tenantless  down 
with  its  long  smooth  curves,  was  broken 
up  into  sudden  hillocks  and  depres- 
sions. Dells  and  dingles,  some  green 
with  bracken,  others  half  full  of  water 
lay  to  right  and  left  of  the  path, 
which,  as  it  approached  the  corner  of 
the  park,  was  more  strongly  marked 
than  when  it  lay  over  the  big  open 
spaces.  It  was  somewhat  slippery, 
too,  after  the  torrent  of  yesterday, 
and  Mr.  Taynton's  stick  saved  him 
more  than  once  from  slipping.  But 
before  he  got  down  to  the  point  where 
the  corner  of  the  park  abutted  on  the 
main  road,  he  had  leaned  on  it  too 
heavily,  and  for  all  its  seeming 
strength,  it  had  broken  in  the  middle. 


158     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

The  two  pieces  were  but  luggage  to  him 
and  just  as  he  came  to  the  road,  he  threw 
them  away  into  a  wooded  hollow  that 
adjoined  the  path.  The  stick  had 
broken  straight  across;  it  was  no  use 
to  think  of  having  it  mended. 

He  was  out  of  the  wind  here,  and 
since  there  was  still  some  ten  minutes 
to  spare,  he  sat  down  on  the  grassy 
edge  of  the  road  to  smoke  a  cigarette. 
The  woods  of  the  park  basked  in  the 
fresh  sunshine;  three  hundred  yards 
away  was  Palmer  Station,  and  beyond 
that  the  line  was  visible  for  a  mile  as 
it  ran  up  the  straight  valley.  Indeed 
he  need  hardly  move  till  he  saw  the 
steam  of  his  train  on  the  limit  of  the 
horizon.  That  would  be  ample  warn- 
ing that  it  was  time  to  go. 

Then  from  far  away,  he  heard  the 
throbbing  of  a  motor,  which  grew 
suddenly  louder  as  it  turned  the  comer 
of  the  road  by  the  station.     It  seemed 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      159 

to  him  to  be  going  very  fast,  and 
the  huge  cloud  of  dust  behind  it 
endorsed  his  impression.  But  almost 
immediately  after  passing  this  comer 
it  began  to  slow  down,  and  the  cloud 
of  dust  behind  it  died  away. 

At  the  edge  of  the  road  where  Mr. 
Taynton  sat,  there  were  standing  several 
thick  bushes.  He  moved  a  little  away 
from  the  road,  and  took  up  his  seat 
again  behind  one  of  them.  The  car 
came  very  slowly  on,  and  stopped 
just  opposite  him.  On  his  right  lay 
the  hollow  where  he  had  thrown  the 
useless  halves  of  his  stick,  on  his  left 
was  the  comer  of  the  Falmer  Park 
railings.  He  had  recognised  the  driver 
of  the  car,  who  was  alone. 

Morris  got  out  when  he  had  stopped 
the  car,  and  then  spoke  aloud,  though 
to  himself. 

"Yes,  there's  the  comer,"  he  said, 
"there's  the  path  over  the  downs. 
There " 


i6o     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

Mr.  Taynton  got  up  and  came  toward 
him. 

"My  dear  fellow,"  he  said,  "I  have 
walked  out  from  Brighton  on  this 
divine  afternoon,  and  was  going  to 
take  the  train  back.  But  will  you  give 
me  the  pleasure  of  driving  back  with 
you  instead?" 

Morris  looked  at  him  a  moment  as 
if  he  hardly  thought  he  was  real. 

"Why,  of  course,"  he  said. 

Mr.  Taynton  was  all  beams  and 
smiles. 

"And  you  have  seen  Mills?"  he 
asked.  "You  have  been  convinced 
that  he  was  innocent  of  the  terrible 
suspicion?  Morris,  my  dear  boy,  what 
is  the  matter?" 

Morris  had  looked  at  him  for  a 
moment  with  incredulous  eyes.  Then 
he  had  sat  down  and  covered  his  face 
with  his  hands. 

"It's  nothing,"  he  said  at  length. 
"I  felt  rather  faint.     I  shall  be  better 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      i6i 

in  a  minute.  Of  course  I  '11  drive 
you  back." 

He  sat  huddled  up  with  hidden  face 
for  a  moment  or  two.  Mr.  Taynton 
said  nothing,  but  only  looked  at  him. 
Then  the  boy  sat  up. 

"I'm  all  right,"  he  said,  "it  was 
just  a  dream  I  had  last  night.  No, 
I  have  not  seen  Mills;  they  tell  me  he 
left  yesterday  afternoon  for  Brighton. 
Shall  we  go?" 

For  some  little  distance  they  went 
in  silence;  then  it  seemed  that  Morris 
made  an  effort  and  spoke. 

"Really,  I  got  what  they  call  'quite 
a  turn'  just  now,"  he  said.  "  I  had  a 
curiously  vivid  dream  last  night  about 
that  comer,  and  you  suddenly  ap- 
peared in  my  dream  quite  unexpect- 
edly, as  you  did  just  now." 

"And  what  was  this  dream?"  asked 
Mr.  Taynton,  turning  up  his  coat 
collar,  for  the  wind  of  their  move- 
ment blew  rather  shrilly  on  to  his  neck. 


i62     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

"Oh,  nothing  particular,"  said  Mor- 
ris carelessly,  "the  vividness  was  con- 
cerned with  your  appearance;  that  was 
what  startled  me." 

Then  he  fell  back  into  the  train  of 
thought  that  had  occupied  him  all 
the  way  down  from  London. 

"I  believe  I  was  half -mad  with 
rage  last  night,"  he  said  at  length, 
"but  this  afternoon,  I  think  I  am 
beginning  to  be  sane  again.  It  's  true 
Mills  tried  to  injure  me,  but  he  didn't 
succeed.  And  as  you  said  last  night 
I  have  too  deep  and  intense  a  cause 
of  happiness  to  give  my  thoughts  and 
energies  to  anything  so  futile  as  hatred 
or  the  desire  for  revenge.  He  is 
punished  already.  The  fact  of  his 
having  tried  to  injure  me  like  that 
was  his  punishment.  Anyhow,  I  am 
sick  and  tired  of  my  anger." 

The  lawyer  did  not  speak  for  a 
moment,  and  when  he  did  his  voice 
was  trembling. 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      163 

"God  bless  you,  my  dear  boy,"  he 
said  gently. 

Morris  devoted  himself  for  some 
little  time  to  the  guiding  of  the  car. 

* '  And  I  want  you  also  to  leave  it  all 
alone,"  he  said  after  a  while.  "I 
don't  want  you  to  dissolve  your  part- 
nership with  him,  or  whatever  you 
call  it.  I  suppose  he  will  guess  that 
you  know  all  about  it,  so  perhaps  it 
would  be  best  if  you  told  him  straight 
out  that  you  do.  And  then  you  can, 
well,  make  a  few  well- chosen  remarks 
you  know,  and  drop  the  whole  damned 
subject  forever." 

Mr.  Taynton  seemed  much  moved. 

''  I  will  try,"  he  said,  "since  you  ask 
it.  But  Morris,  you  are  more  generous 
than  I  am." 

Morris  laughed,  his  usual  boyish 
high  spirits  and  simplicity  were 
reasserting  themselves  again. 

"Oh,  that 's  all  rot,"  he  said.  "  It  's 
only  because  it  's  so  fearfully  tiring  to 


i64     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

go  on  being  angry.  But  I  can't  help 
wondering  what  has  happened  to  the 
fellow.  They  told  me  at  his  flat  in 
town  that  he  went  off  with  his  luggage 
yesterday  afternoon,  and  gave  orders 
that  all  letters  were  to  be  sent  to 
his  Brighton  address.  You  don't  think 
there  *s  anything  wrong,  do  you?" 

"My  dear  fellow,  what  could  be 
wrong?"  asked  Mr.  Taquta.  "He  had 
some  business  to  do  at  Lewes  on  his 
way  down,  and  I  make  no  doubt  he 
slept  there,  probably  forgetting  all 
about  his  appointment  with  me.  I 
would  wager  you  that  we  shall  find 
he  is  in  Brighton  when  we  get  in." 

"I'll  take  that,"  said  Morris. 
"Half  a  crown." 

"No,  no,  my  usual  shilling,  my 
usual  shilling,"  laughed  the  other. 

Morris  set  Mr.  Taynton  down  at  his 
office,  and  by  way  of  settling  their 
w^ager   at   once,    waited   at   the   door, 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      165 

while  the  other  went  upstairs  to  see 
if  his  partner  was  there.  He  had  not, 
however,  appeared  there  that  day, 
and  Mr.  Taynton  sent  a  clerk  down  to 
Morris,  to  ask  him  to  come  up,  and 
they  would  ring  up  Mr.  Mills's  flat  on 
the  telephone. 

This  was  done,  and  before  many 
seconds  had  elapsed  they  were  in 
communication.  His  valet  was  there, 
still  waiting  for  his  master's  return, 
for  he  had  not  yet  come  back.  It 
appeared  that  he  was  getting  rather 
anxious,  for  Mr. Taynton  reassured  him. 

' '  There  is  not  the  slightest  cause  for 
any  anxiety,"  were  his  concluding 
words.  "  I  feel  convinced  he  has  merely 
been  detained.  Thanks,  that  's  all. 
Please  let  me  know  as  soon  as  he 
returns." 

He  drew  a  shilling  from  his  pocket, 
and  handed  it  to  Morris.  But  his 
face,  in  spite  of  his  reassuring  words, 
was    a    little    troubled.     You    would 


i66     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

have  said  that  though  he  might  not  yet 
be  anxious,  he  saw  that  there  was 
some  possibihty  of  his  being  so,  before 
very  long.     Yet  he  spoke  gaily  enough. 

"And  I  made  so  sure  I  should  win," 
he  said.  "I  shall  put  it  down  to 
unexpected  losses,  not  connected  with 
business;  eh,  Mr.  Timmins?  Or  shall 
it  be  charity?  It  would  never  do  to 
put  down  '  Betting  losses.'  " 

But  this  was  plainly  a  little  forced, 
and  Morris  waited  till  Mr.  Timmins 
had  gone  out. 

"And  you  really  meant  that?"  he 
asked.     "You  are  really  not  anxious?" 

"No,  I  am  not  anxious,"  he  said,  "but 
—  but  I  shall  be  glad  when  he  comes 
back.  Is  that  inconsistent  ?  I  think 
perhaps  it  is.  Well,  let  us  say  then  that 
I  am  just  a  shade  anxious.  But  I  may 
add  that  I  feel  sure  my  anxiety  is  quite 
unnecessary.    That  defines  it  for  you. " 

Morris    went    straight    home    from 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      167 

here,  and  found  that  his  mother  had 
just  returned  from  her  afternoon  drive. 
She  had  found  the  blotting  book 
waiting  for  her  when  she  came  back 
that  morning,  and  was  deUghted  with 
the  gift  and  the  loving  remembering 
thought  that  inspired  it. 

"But  you  shouldn't  spend  your 
money  on  me,  my  darling,"  she  said  to 
Morris,  "though  I  just  love  the  im- 
pulse that  made  you." 

"Oh,  very  well,"  said  Morris,  kissing 
her,  "let  's  have  the  initials  changed 
about  then,  and  let  it  be  M.  A.  from 
H.  A." 

Then  his  voice  grew  grave. 

"Mother  dear,  I  've  got  another 
birthday  present  for  you.  I  think  — 
I  think  you  will  like  it." 

She  saw  at  once  that  he  was  speaking 
of  no  tangible  material  gift. 

"Yes,  dear?"  she  said. 

' '  Madge  and  me, ' '  said  Morris.  '  'Just 
that." 


i68     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

And  Mrs.  Assheton  did  like  this 
second  present,  and  though  it  made  her 
cry  a  httle,  her  tears  were  the  sweetest 
that  can  be  shed. 

Mother  and  son  dined  alone  together, 
and  since  Morris  had  determined  to 
forget,  to  put  out  of  his  mind  the 
hideous  injury  that  Mills  had  at- 
tempted to  do  him,  he  judged  it  to  be 
more  consistent  with  this  resolve  to 
tell  his  mother  nothing  about  it,  since 
to  mention  it  to  another,  even  to  her, 
implied  that  he  was  not  doing  his  best 
to  bury  what  he  determined  should 
be  dead  to  him.  As  usual,  they  played 
backgammon  together,  and  it  was  not 
till  Mrs.  Assheton  rose  to  go  to  bed 
that  she  remembered  Mr.  Taynton's 
note,  asking  her  and  Morris  to  dine 
with  him  on  their  earliest  unoccupied 
day.  This,  as  is  the  way  in  the 
country,  happened  to  be  the  next 
evening,  and  since  the  last  post   had 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      169 

already  gone  out,  she  asked  Morris  if 
Martin  might  take  the  note  round  for 
her  to-night,  since  it  ought  to  have 
been  answered  before. 

That,  of  course,  was  easily  done, 
and  Morris  told  his  servant  to  call 
also  at  the  house  where  Mr.  Mills's 
flat  was  situated,  and  ask  the  porter 
if  he  had  come  home.  The  note 
dispatched  his  mother  went  to  bed, 
and  Morris  went  down  to  the  billiard 
room  to  practise  spot-strokes,  a  form 
of  hazard  at  which  he  was  singularly 
inefficient,  and  wait  for  news.  Little 
as  he  knew  Mills,  and  little  cause  as 
he  had  for  liking  him,  he  too,  like  Mr. 
Taynton,  felt  vaguely  anxious  and  per- 
turbed, since  "disappearances"  are 
necessarily  hedged  about  with  mystery 
and  wondering.  His  own  anger  and 
hatred,  too,  like  mists  drawn  up  and 
dispersed  by  the  sun  of  love  that  had 
dawned  on  him,  had  altogether  van- 
ished; the  attempt  against  him  had,  as 


I70     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

it  turned  out,  been  so  futile,  and  he 
genuinely  wished  to  have  some  as- 
surance of  the  safety  of  the  man,  the 
thought  of  whom  had  so  blackened  his 
soul  only  twenty-four  hours  ago. 

His  errands  took  Martin  the  best 
part  of  an  hour,  and  he  returned  with 
two  notes,  one  for  Mrs.  Assheton,  the 
other  for  Morris.  He  had  been  also 
to  the  flat  and  inquired,  but  there 
was  no  news  of  the  missing  man. 

Morris  opened  his  note,  which  was 
from  Mr.  Taynton. 

Dear  Morris, 

I  am  delighted  that  your  mother  and 
you  can  dine  to-morrow,  and  I  am  tele- 
graphing first  thing  in  the  morning  to  see 
if  Miss  Madge  will  make  our  fourth.  I 
feel  sure  that  when  she  knows  what  my 
little  party  is,  she  will  come. 

I  have  been  twice  round  to  see  if  my 
partner  has  returned,  and  find  no  news  of 
him.  It  is  idle  to  deny  that  I  am  getting 
anxious,  as  I  cannot  conceive  what  has 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     171 

happened.  Should  he  not  be  back  by 
to-morrow  morning,  I  shall  put  the  matter 
into  the  hands  of  the  police.  I  trust 
that  my  anxieties  are  imfounded,  but  the 
matter  is  beginning  to  look  strange. 
Affectionately  yours, 
Edward  Taynton. 

There  is  nothing  so  infectious  as 
anxiety,  and  it  can  be  conveyed  by 
look  or  word  or  letter,  and  requires  no 
period  of  incubation.  And  Morris 
began  to  be  really  anxious  also,  with  a 
vague  disquietude  at  the  sense  of  there 
being  something  wrong. 


CHAPTER   VIII 

MR.  TAYNTON,  according  to  the 
intention  he  had  expressed, 
sent  round  early  next  morning  (the 
day  of  the  week  being  Saturday)  to  his 
partner's  flat,  and  finding  that  he  was 
not  there,  and  that  no  word  of  any 
kind  had  been  received  from  him, 
went,  as  he  felt  himself  now  bound  to 
do,  to  the  police  office,  stated  what 
had  brought  him  there,  and  gave 
them  all  information  which  it  was  in 
his  power  to  give. 

It  was  brief  enough;  his  partner  had 
gone  up  to  town  on  Tuesday  last, 
and,  had  he  followed  his  plans  should 
have  returned  to  Brighton  by  Thursday 
evening,  since  he  had  made  an  appoint- 
ment to  come  to  Mr.  Ta>Titon's  house 
at  nine  thirty  that  night.  It  had  been 
172 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      173 

ascertained  too,  by  —  Mr.  Taynton 
hesitated  a  moment  —  by  Mr.  Morris 
Assheton  in  London,  that  he  had 
left  his  fiat  in  St.  James's  Court 
on  Thursday  afternoon,  to  go,  pre- 
sumably, to  catch  the  train  back 
to  Brighton.  He  had  also  left  orders 
that  all  letters  should  be  forwarded  to 
him  at  his  Brighton  address. 

Superintendent  Figgis,  to  whom  Mr. 
Taynton  made  his  statement,  was 
in  manner  slow,  stout,  and  bored,  and 
looked  in  every  way  utterly  unfitted 
to  find  clues  to  the  least  mysterious 
occurences,  unearth  crime  or  run  down 
the  criminal.  He  seemed  quite  incap- 
able of  running  down  anything,  and  Mr. 
Taynton  had  to  repeat  everything  he 
said  in  order  to  be  sure  that  Mr. 
Figgis  got  his  notes,  which  he  made  in 
a  large  round  hand,  with  laborious 
distinctness,  correctly  written.  Hav- 
ing finished  them  the  Superintendent 
stared  at  them  mournfully  for  a  little 


174     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

while,  and  asked  Mr.  Ta>Titon  if  he  had 
anything  more  to  add. 

**I  think  that  is  all,"  said  the 
law^'er.  "Ah,  one  moment.  Mr.  Mills 
expressed  to  me  the  intention  of 
perhaps  getting  out  at  Falmer  and 
walking  over  the  downs  to  Brighton. 
But  Thursday  was  the  evening  on 
which  we  had  that  terrible  thunder- 
storm. I  should  think  it  very  un- 
likely that  he  would  have  left  the 
train." 

Superintendent  Figgis  appeared  to 
be  trying  to  recollect  something. 

"Was  there  a  thunderstorm  on 
Thursday?"  he  asked. 

"The  most  severe  I  ever  remember," 
said  Mr.  Ta^-nton. 

"It  had  slipped  my  memory,"  said 
this  incompetent  agent  of  justice. 

But  a  little  thought  enable  him  to 
ask  a  question  that  bore  on  the  case. 

"He  travelled  then  by  Lewes  and 
not  by  the  direct  route?" 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      175 

"Presumably.  He  had  a  season 
ticket  via  Lewes,  since  our  business 
often  took  him  there.  Had  he  intended 
to  travel  by  Hayward's  Heath,"  said 
Mr.  Taynton  rather  laboriously,  as  if 
explaining  something  to  a  child,  "he 
could  not  have  intended  to  get  out  at 
Falmer." 

Mr.  Figgis  had  to  think  over  this, 
which  he  did  with  his  mouth  open. 

"Seeing  that  the  Hayward's  Heath 
line  does  not  pass  Falmer,"  he 
suggested. 

Mr.  Taynton  drew  a  sheet  of  paper 
toward  him  and  kindly  made  a  rough 
sketch-map  of  railway  lines. 

"And  his  season  ticket  went  by 
the  Lewes  line,"  he  explained. 

Superintendent  Figgis  appeared  to 
understand  this  after  a  while.  Then 
he  sighed  heavily,  and  changed  the 
subject  with  rather  disconcerting 
abruptness. 

"From  my  notes  I  understand  that 


176     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

Mr.  Morris  Assheton  ascertained  that 
the  missing  individual  had  left  his  flat 
in  London  on  Thursday  afternoon," 
he  said. 

"Yes,  Mr.  Assheton  is  a  client  of 
ours,  and  he  wished  to  see  my  partner 
on  a  business  matter.  In  fact,  when 
Mr.  Mills  was  found  not  to  have 
returned  on  Thursday  evening,  he  went 
up  to  London  next  day  to  see  him, 
since  we  both  supposed  he  had  been 
detained  there." 

Mr.  Figgis  looked  once  more  mourn- 
fully at  his  notes,  altered  a  palpably 
mistaken  "Wednesday"  into  Thurs- 
day, and  got  up. 

"The  matter  shall  be  gone  into," 
he  said. 

Mr.  Taynton  went  straight  from  here 
to  his  office,  and  for  a  couple  of  hours 
devoted  himself  to  the  business  of  his 
firm,  giving  it  his  whole  attention  and 
working    perhaps    with    more    speed 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      177 

than  it  was  usually  his  to  command. 
Saturday  of  course  was  a  half -holiday, 
and  it  was  naturally  his  desire  to  get 
cleared  off  everything  that  would 
otherwise  interrupt  the  well-earned 
repose  and  security  from  business  affairs 
which  was  to  him  the  proper  atmos- 
phere of  the  seventh,  or  as  he  called 
it,  the  first  day.  This  interview  with 
the  accredited  representative  of  the 
law  also  had  removed  a  certain  weight 
from  his  mind.  He  had  placed  the 
matter  of  his  partner's  disappearance 
in  official  hands,  he  had  done  all  he 
could  do  to  clear  up  his  absence,  and, 
in  case  —  but  here  he  pulled  himself 
up;  it  was  at  present  most  premature 
even  to  look  at  the  possibility  of  crime 
having  been  committed. 

Mr.  Taynton  was  in  no  way  a  vain 
man,  nor  was  it  his  habit  ever  to 
review  his  own  conduct,  with  the 
object  of  contrasting  it  favourably  with 
what  others  might  have  done  under  the 


178      THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

circumstances.  Yet  he  could  not  help 
being  aware  that  others  less  kindly  than 
he  would  have  shrugged  sarcastic 
shoulders  and  said,  "probably  another 
blackmailing  errand  has  detained  him." 
For,  indeed,  Mills  had  i)aintcd  him.self 
in  very  ugly  colours  in  his  last  interview 
with  him;  that  horrid  hint  of  blackmail, 
■svhich  still,  so  to  speak,  held  good,  had 
cast  a  new  light  on  him.  But  now 
Taynton  was  conscious  of  no  grudge 
against  him;  he  did  not  say,  "he  can  look 
after  himself."  He  was  anxious  about 
his  continued  absence,  and  had  taken  the 
extreme  step  of  calling  in  the  aid  of  the 
police,  the  national  guardian  of 
personal  safety. 

He  got  away  from  his  oflfice  about 
half-past  twelve  and  in  preparation 
for  the  little  dinner  festival  of  this 
evening,  for  Miss  Templeton  had  sent 
her  jo>'ful  telegraphic  acceptance,  went 
to  several  shops  to  order  some  few  little 
delicacies  to  grace  his  plain  bachelor 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      179 

table.  An  ice-pudding,  for  instance,  was 
outside  the  orbit,  so  he  feared  of  his  plain 
though  excellent  cook,  and  two  little 
dishes  of  chocolates  and  sweets,  since 
he  was  at  the  confectioner's,  would  be 
appropriate  to  the  taste  of  his  lady 
guests.  Again  a  floral  decoration  of 
the  table  was  indicated,  and  since  the 
storm  of  Thursday,  there  was  nothing 
in  his  garden  worthy  of  the  occasion; 
thus  a  visit  to  the  florist's  resulted 
in  an  order  for  smilax  and  roses. 

He  got  home,  however,  at  his  usual 
luncheon  hour  to  find  a  telegram 
waiting  for  him  on  the  Heppelwhite 
table  in  the  hall.  There  had  been  a 
continued  buying  of  copper  shares, 
and  the  feature  was  a  sensational  rise 
in  Bostons,  which  during  the  morning 
had  gone  up  a  clear  point. 

Mr.  Taynton  had  no  need  to  make 
calculations;  he  knew,  as  a  man  knows 
the  multiplication  table  of  two,  what 


i8o     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

every  fraction  of  a  rise  in  Bostons 
meant  to  him,  and  this,  provided  only 
he  had  time  to  sell  at  once,  meant  the 
complete  recovery  of  the  losses  he 
had  suffered.  With  those  active 
markets  it  was  still  easily  possible 
though  it  was  Saturday,  to  effect  his 
sale,  since  there  was  sure  to  be  long 
continued  business  in  the  Street  and 
he  had  but  to  be  able  to  exercise  his 
option  at  that  price,  to  be  quit  of  that 
dreadful  incubus  of  anxiety  which  for 
the  last  two  years  had  been  a  millstone 
round  his  neck  that  had  grown  mush- 
room like.  The  telephone  to  town,  of 
course,  was  far  the  quickest  mode  of 
communication,  and  having  given  his 
order  he  waited  ten  minutes  till  the 
tube  babbled  and  croaked  to  him  again. 
There  is  a  saying  that  things 
are  "too  good  to  be  true,"  but  when 
Mr.  Taynton  sat  down  to  his  lunch 
that  day,  he  felt  that  the  converse  of 
the  proverb  w^as  the  correcter  epigram. 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     i8i 

Things  could  be  so  good  that  they 
must  be  true,  and  here,  still  ringing 
in  his  ears  was  one  of  them  —  Morris 
—  it  was  thus  he  phrased  it  to 
himself  —  was  "paid  off,"  or,  in  more 
business-like  language,  the  fortune  of 
which  Mr.  Taynton  was  trustee  was 
intact  again,  and,  like  a  tit-bit 
for  a  good  child,  there  was  an  addi- 
tional five  or  six  hundred  pounds 
for  him  who  had  managed  the  trust 
so  well.  Mr.  Taynton  could  not  help 
feeling  somehow  that  he  deserved  it; 
he  had  increased  Morris's  fortune  since 
he  had  charge  of  it  by  ;^  10,000.  And 
what  a  lesson,  too,  he  had  had,  so 
gently  and  painlessly  taught  him! 
No  one  knew  better  than  he  how 
grievously  wrong  he  had  got,  in  gamb- 
ling with  trust  money.  Yet  now  it 
had  come  right:  he  had  repaired  the 
original  wrong;  on  Monday  he  would 
reinvest  this  capital  in  those  holdings 
which    he    had    sold,     and    Morris's 


i82     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

;{^4o,ooo  (so  largely  the  result  of  careful 
and  judicious  investment)  would  cer- 
tainly stand  the  scrutiny  of  any  who 
could  possibly  hav^e  any  cauie  to 
examine  his  ledgers.  Indeed  there 
would  be  nothing  to  see.  Two  years 
ago  Mr.  Morris  Assheton's  fortune  was 
invested  in  certain  railway  debentures 
and  Government  stock.  It  would  in  a 
few  days'  time  be  invested  there  again, 
precisely  as  it  had  been.  Mr.  Taynton 
had  not  been  dealing  in  gilt-edged 
securities  lately,  and  could  not  abso- 
lutely trust  his  memory,  but  he  rather 
thought  that  the  repurchase  could  be 
made  at  a  somewhat  smaller  sum  than 
had  been  realised  by  their  various 
sales  dating  from  two  years  ago.  In 
that  case  there  was  a  little  more  sub 
rosa  reward  for  this  well- inspired  jus- 
tice, weighed  but  featherwise  against  the 
overwhelming  relief  of  the  knowledge 
he  could  make  wrong  things  right  again, 
repair  his,  yes,  his  scoundrelism. 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     183 

How  futile,    too,   now,    was   Mills's 
threatened  blackmail!     Mills  might,  if 
he  chose,  proclaim  on  any  convenient 
housetop,      that     his      partner     had 
gambled  with   Morris's   ;^4o>ooo   that 
according  to  the  ledgers  was  invested  in 
certain  railway  debentures  and  other 
gilt-edged  securities.     In  a  few  days, 
any  scrutiny  might  be  made  of  the 
securities  lodged  at  the  County  Bank, 
and  assuredly  among  them  would  be 
found    those    debentures,    those    gilt- 
edged  securities  exactly  as  they  ap- 
peared in  the  ledgers.  Yet  Mr.  Taynton, 
so  kindly  is  the  nature  of  happiness,  con- 
templated  no  revengeful   step  on  his 
partner;    he    searched    his  heart  and 
found  that  no  trace  of  rancour  against 
poor  Mills  was  hoarded  there. 

Whether  happiness  makes  us  good, 
is  a  question  not  yet  decided,  but  it 
is  quite  certain  that  happiness  makes 
us  forget  that  we  have  been  bad,  and  it 
seemed  to  Mr.  Taynton,  as  he  sat  in  his 


i84     THE  BLOrriNG  BOOK 

cool  dining-room,  and  ate  his  lunch  with 
a  more  vivid  appetite  than  had  been  his 
for  many  months,  it  seemed  that  the 
man  who  had  gambled  with  his  client's 
money  was  no  longer  himself;  it  was 
a  perfectly  different  person  who  had 
done  that.  It  was  a  different  man,  too, 
who,  so  few  days  ago  had  connived  at 
and  applauded  the  sorry  trick  which 
Mills  had  tried  to  play  on  Morris,  when 
(so  futilely,  it  is  true)  he  had  slandered 
him  to  Sir  Richard.  Now  he  felt  that 
he  —  this  man  that  to-day  sat  here  — 
was  incapable  of  such  meannesses. 
And,  thank  God,  it  was  never  too  late; 
from  to-day  he  would  lead  the  honour- 
able, upright  existence  which  the  world 
(apart  from  his  partner)  had  always 
credited  him  with  leading. 

He  basked  in  the  full  sunshine  of 
these  happy  and  comfortable  thoughts, 
and  even  as  the  sun  of  midsummer 
lingered  long  on  the  sea  and  hills,  so 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     185 

for  hours  this  inward  sunshine  warmed 
and  cheered  him.  Nor  was  it  till  he 
saw  by  his  watch  that  he  must  return 
from  the  long  pleasant  ramble  on  which 
he  had  started  as  soon  as  lunch  was 
over,  that  a  cloud  filmy  and  thin  at 
first  began  to  come  across  the  face  of 
the  sun.  Once  and  again  those  genial 
beams  dispersed  it,  but  soon  it  seemed 
as  if  the  vapours  were  getting  the 
upper  hand.  A  thought,  in  fact,  had 
crossed  Mr.  Taynton's  mind  that  quite 
distinctly  dimmed  his  happiness.  But 
a  little  reflection  told  him  that  a  very 
simple  step  on  his  part  would  put  that 
right  again,  and  he  walked  home 
rather  more  quickly  than  he  had  set 
out,  since  he  had  this  little  bit  of 
business  to  do  before  dinner. 

He  went  —  this  was  only  natural  — 
to  the  house  where  Mr.  Mills's  flat  was 
situated,  and  inquired  of  the  porter 
whether  his  partner  had  yet  returned. 
But  the  same  answer  as  before  was 


i86      THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

given  him,  and  saying  that  he  had 
need  of  a  document  that  Mills  had 
taken  home  with  him  three  days  before 
he  went  up  in  the  hft,  and  rang  the 
bell  of  the  flat.  But  it  was  not  his 
ser\'ant  who  opened  it,  but  sad  Super- 
intendent Figgis. 

For  some  reason  this  was  rather  a 
shock  to  Mr.  Taynton;  to  expect  one 
face  and  see  another  is  always  (though 
ever  so  slightly)  upsetting,  but  he 
instantly  recovered  himself  and 
explained  his  errand. 

"My  partner  took  home  with  him 
on  Tuesday  a  paper,  which  is  con- 
cerned with  my  business,"  he  said. 
' '  Would  you  kindly  let  me  look  round 
or  it?" 

Mr.   Figgis  weighed  this  request. 

"  Nothing  must  be  removed  from  the 
rooms,"  he  said,  "till  we  have  finished 
our  search." 

"Search  for  what?"  asked  Mr. 
Ta}Titon. 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      187 

"Any  possible  clue  as  to  the  reason 
of  Mr.  Mills's  disappearance.  But  in 
ten  minutes  we  shall  have  done,  if  you 
care  to  wait." 

"I  don't  want  to  remove  anything." 
said  the  lawyer.  ' '  I  merely  want  to 
consult " 

At  the  moment  another  man  in 
plain  clothes  came  out  of  the  sitting- 
room.  He  carried  in  his  hand  two  or 
three  letters,  and  a  few  scraps  of 
crumpled  paper.  There  was  an 
envelope  or  two  among  them. 

"We  have  finished,  sir,"  he  said  to 
the  Superintendent. 

Mr.  Figgis  turned  to  the  lawyer,  who 
was  looking  rather  fixedly  at  what  the 
other  man  had  in  his  hand. 

"My  document  may  be  among 
those,"  he  said. 

Mr.  Figgis  handed  them  to  him. 
There  were  two  envelopes,  both  ad- 
dressed to  the  missing  man,  one 
bearing    his   name   only,    some   small 


i88     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

tom-up  scrap  of  paper,  and  three  or 
four  private  letters. 

"Is  it  among  these?"  he  asked. 

Mr.  Ta)'nton  turned  them  over. 

*  *  No, "  he  said , "  i  t  was  —  it  was  a  large, 
yes,  a  large  blue  paper,  official  looking." 

"No  such  thing  in  the  flat,  sir," 
said  the  second  man. 

"Very  annoying,"  said  the  lawyer. 

An  idea  seemed  slowly  to  strike  Mr. 
Figgis. 

"He  may  have  taken  it  to  London 
with  him,"  he  said.  "But  will  you 
not  look  round?" 

Mr.  Ta>Titon  did  so.  He  also  looked 
in  the  waste-paper  basket,  but  it  was 
empty. 

So  he  went  back  to  make  ready  to 
receive  his  guests,  for  the  little  party. 
But  it  had  got  dark;  this  "document" 
whatever  it  was,  appeared  to  trouble 
him.  The  simple  step  he  had  contem- 
plated had  not  led  him  in  quite  the 
right  direction. 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     189 

The  Superintendent  with  his  col- 
league went  back  into  the  sitting- 
room  on  the  lawyer's  departure,  and 
Mr.  Figgis  took  from  his  pocket  most 
of  his  notes. 

"I  went  to  the  station,  Wilkinson," 
he  said,  "and  in  the  lost  luggage 
office  I  found  Mr.  Mills's  bag.  It  had 
arrived  on  Thursday  evening.  But  it 
seems  pretty  certain  that  its  owner 
did  not  arrive  with  it." 

"Looks  as  if  he  did  get  out  at  Pal- 
mer," said  Wilkinson. 

Figgis  took  a  long  time  to  consider 
this. 

"It  is  possible,"  he  said.  "It  is 
also  possible  that  he  put  his  luggage 
into  the  train  in  London,  and  sub- 
sequently missed  the  train  himself." 

Then  together  they  went  through 
the  papers  that  might  conceivably 
help  them.  There  was  a  torn-up  letter 
found  in  his  bedroom  fireplace,  and 
the    crumpled   up    envelope  that  be- 


iQo     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

longed  to  it.  They  patiently  pieced 
this  together,  but  found  nothing  of 
value.  The  other  letters  referred  only 
to  his  engagements  in  London,  none 
of  which  were  later  than  Thursday 
morning.  There  remained  one  crum- 
pled up  envelo]~)e  (also  from  the  ]')aper- 
basket)  but  no  letter  that  in  any  way 
corresponded  with  it.  It  was  ad- 
dressed in  a  rather  sprawling,  eager, 
boyish  hand. 

"No  letter  of  any  sort  to  corre- 
spond?" asked  Figgis  for  the  second 
time. 

"No." 

"I  think  for  the  present  we  will 
keep  it,"  said  he. 

The  little  party  at  Mr.  Taynton's 
was  gay  to  the  point  of  foolishness, 
and  of  them  all  none  was  more  light- 
hearted  than  the  host.  Morris  had 
asked  him  in  an  undertone,  on  arrival, 
whether   any   more   had   been   heard, 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      191 

and  learning  there  was  still  no  news, 
had  dismissed  the  subject  altogether, 
The  sunshine  of  the  day,  too,  had 
come  back  to  the  lawyer;  his  usual 
cheerful  serenity  was  touched  with  a 
sort  of  sympathetic  boisterousness,  at 
the  huge  spirits  of  the  young  couple 
and  it  was  to  be  recorded  that  after 
dinner  they  played  musical  chairs 
and  blind-man's  buff,  with  infinite 
laughter.  Never  was  an  elderly  soli- 
citor so  spontaneously  gay;  indeed 
before  long  it  was  he  who  reinfected 
the  others  with  merriment.  But  as 
always,  after  abandonment  to  laughter 
a  little  reaction  followed,  and  when 
they  went  upstairs  from  his  sitting- 
room  where  they  had  been  so  uproari- 
ous, so  that  it  might  be  made  tidy  again 
before  Sunday,  and  sat  in  the  drawing- 
room  overlooking  the  street,  there  did 
come  this  little  reaction.  But  it  was 
already  eleven,  and  soon  Mrs.  Assheton 
rose  to  go. 


192     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

The  night  was  hot,  and  Morris  was 
sitting  to  cool  himself  by  the  open 
window,  leaning  his  head  out  to  catch 
the  breeze.  The  street  was  very  empty 
and  cjuiet,  and  his  motor,  in  which 
as  a  great  concession,  his  mother  had 
consented  to  be  carried,  on  the  promise 
of  his  going  slow,  had  already  come 
for  them.  Then  down  at  the  seaward 
end  of  the  street  he  heard  street-cries, 
as  if  some  sudden  news  had  come  in 
that  sent  the  vendors  of  the  evening 
papers  out  to  reap  a  second  harvest 
that  night.  He  could  not,  however, 
catch  what  it  was,  and  they  all  went 
downstairs  together. 

Madge  was  going  home  with  them, 
for  she  was  stopping  over  the  Sunday 
with  Mrs.  Assheton,  and  the  two  ladies 
had  already  got  into  the  car,  while 
Morris  was  still  standing  on  the 
pavement  with  his  host. 

Then  suddenly  a  newsboy,  w^ith  a 
sheaf  of  papers  still  hot  from  the  press. 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     193 

came  running  from  the  comer  of  the 
street  just  above  them,  and  as  he  ran 
he  shouted  out  the  news  which  was 
already  making  httle  groups  of  people 
collect  and  gather  in  the  streets. 
,  Mr.  Taynton  turned  quickly  as  the 
words  became  audible,  seized  a  paper 
from  the  boy,  giving  him  the  first  coin 
that  he  found,  and  ran  back  into  the 
hall  of  his  house,  Morris  with  him, 
to  beneath  the  electric  light  that 
burned  there.  The  shrill  voice  of  the 
boy  still  shouting  the  news  of  murder 
got  gradually  less  loud  as  he  went 
further  down  the  street. 

They  read  the  short  paragraph 
together,  and  then  looked  at  each 
other  with  mute  horror  in  their  eyes. 


CHAPTER    IX 

THE  inquest  was  held  at  Palmer 
on  the  Monday  following,  when 
the  body  was  fonnally  identified  by 
Mr.  Taynton  and  Mills's  servant,  and 
they  both  had  to  give  evidence  as 
regards  what  they  knew  of  the  move- 
ments of  the  deceased.  This,  as  a 
matter  of  fact,  Mr.  Taynton  had  already 
given  to  Figgis,  and  in  his  examination 
now  he  repeated  with  absolute  exacti- 
tude what  he  had  said  before  including 
again  the  fact  that  Morris  had  gone 
up  to  town  on  Friday  morning  to  try 
to  find  him  there.  On  this  occasion, 
however,  a  few  further  questions  w^ere 
put  to  him,  eliciting  the  fact  that 
the  business  on  which  Morris  wanted 
to  see  him  was  known  to  Mr.  Taynton 
but  could  not  be  by  him  repeated 
194 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      195 

since  it  dealt  with  confidential  trans- 
actions between  the  firm  of  solicitors 
and  their  client.  The  business  was, 
yes,  of  the  nature  of  a  dispute,  but 
Mr.  Taynton  regarded  it  as  certain 
that  some  amicable  arrangement  would 
have  been  come  to,  had  the  interview 
taken  place.  As  it  had  not,  however, 
since  Morris  had  not  found  him  at  his 
flat  in  town,  he  could  not  speak  for 
certain  on  this  subject.  The  dispute 
concerned  an  action  of  his  partner's, 
made  independently  of  him.  Had  he 
been  consulted  he  would  have  strongly 
disapproved  of  it. 

The  body,  as  was  made  public  now, 
had  been  discovered  by  accident, 
though,  as  has  been  seen,  the  prob- 
ability of  Mills  having  got  out  at 
Palmer  had  been  arrived  at  by  the 
police,  and  Figgis  immediately  after 
his  interview  with  Mr.  Taynton  on  the 
Saturday  evening  had  started  for 
Falmer  to  make  inquiries  there,  and 


196     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

had  arrived  there  within  a  few  minutes 
of  the  discovery  of  the  body.  A 
carpenter  of  that  village  had  strolled 
out  about  eight  o'clock  that  night 
with  his  two  children  while  supper  was 
being  got  ready,  and  had  gone  a  piece 
of  the  way  up  the  path  over  the  downs, 
which  left  the  road  at  the  comer  of 
Falmer  Park.  The  children  were  run- 
ning and  playing  about,  hiding  and 
seeking  each  other  in  the  bracken- 
filled  hollows,  and  among  the  trees, 
when  one  of  them  screamed  suddenly, 
and  a  moment  afterward  they  both 
came  running  to  their  father,  saying 
that  they  had  come  upon  a  man  in  one 
of  these  copses,  lying  on  his  face  and 
they  were  frightened.  He  had  gone 
to  see  what  this  terrifying  person  was, 
and  had  found  the  body.  He  went 
straight  back  to  the  village  without 
touching  anything,  for  it  was  clear 
both  from  what  he  saw  and  from  the 
crowd  of  buzzing  flies  that  the  man 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     197 

was  dead,  and  gave  information  to 
the  police.  Then  within  a  few  minutes 
from  that,  Mr.  Figgis  had  arrived 
from  Brighton,  to  find  that  it  was 
superfluous  to  look  any  further  or 
inquire  any  more  concerning  the 
whereabouts  of  the  missing  man.  All 
that  was  mortal  of  him  was  here,  the 
head  covered  with  a  cloth,  and  bits  of 
the  fresh  summer  growth  of  fern  and 
frond  sticking  to  his  clothing. 

After  the  identification  of  the  body 
came  evidence  medical  and  otherwise 
that  seemed  to  show  beyond  doubt 
the  time  and  manner  of  his  death  and 
the  possible  motive  of  the  murderer. 
The  base  of  the  skull  was  smashed  in, 
evidently  by  some  violent  blow  dealt 
from  behind  with  a  blunt  heavy  instru- 
ment of  some  sort,  and  death  had 
probably  been  instantaneous.  In  one 
of  the  pockets  was  a  first  edition  of 
an  evening  paper  published  in  London 
on    Thursday    last,    which    fixed    the 


198     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

earliest  possible  time  at  which  the 
murder  had  been  committed,  while 
in  the  opinion  of  the  doctor  who 
examined  the  body  late  on  Saturday 
night,  the  man  had  been  dead  not  less 
than  forty-eight  hours.  In  spite 
of  the  ver\'  heavy  rain  which  had 
fallen  on  Thursday  night,  there  were 
traces  of  a  jdooI  of  blood  about  mid- 
way between  the  clump  of  bracken 
where  the  body  was  found,  and  the 
path  over  the  do\\'ns  leading  from 
Falmer  to  Brighton.  This,  taken  in 
conjunction  with  the  information 
already  given  by  Mr.  Taynton,  made 
it  practically  certain  that  the  deceased 
had  left  London  on  the  Thursday  as 
he  had  intended  to  do,  and  had  got  out 
of  the  train  at  Falmer,  also  according 
to  his  expressed  intention,  to  walk  to 
Brighton.  It  would  again  have  been 
most  improbable  that  he  would  have 
started  on  his  walk  had  the  storm 
already    begun.     But    the    train    by 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      199 

which  his  bag  was  conveyed  to  Brigh- 
ton arrived  at  Falmer  at  half -past  six, 
the  storm  did  not  burst  till  an  hour 
afterward.  Finally,  with  regard  to 
possible  motive,  the  murdered  man's 
watch  was  missing;  his  pockets  also 
were  empty  of  coin. 

This  concluded  the  evidence,  and 
the  verdict  was  brought  in  without 
the  jury  leaving  the  court,  and  ' '  wilful 
murder  by  person  or  persons  unknown' ' 
was  recorded. 

Mr.  Taynton,  as  was  indeed  to  be 
expected,  had  been  much  affected 
during  the  giving  of  his  evidence,  and 
when  the  inquest  was  over,  he  returned 
to  Brighton  feeling  terribly  upset  by 
this  sudden  tragedy,  which  had  crashed 
without  warning  into  his  life.  It  had 
been  so  swift  and  terrible;  without 
sign  or  preparation  this  man,  whom 
he  had  known  so  long,  had  been 
hurled  from  life  and  all  its  vigour  into 


200     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

death.  And  how  utterly  now  Mr. 
Ta)'nton  forgave  him  for  that  base 
attack  that  he  had  made  on  him, 
so  few  days  ago;  how  utterly,  too, 
he  felt  sure  Morris  had  forgiven  him 
for  what  was  perhaps  even  hajder  to 
forgive.  And  if  they  could  forgive 
trespasses  like  these,  they  who  were  of 
human  passion  and  resentments,  surely 
the  reader  of  all  hearts  would  forgive. 
That  moment  of  agony  short  though 
it  might  have  been  in  actual  duration, 
when  the  murderous  weapon  split 
through  the  bone  and  scattered  the 
brain,  surely  brought  punishment  and 
therefore  atonement  for  the  frailties  of 
a  life-time. 

Mr.  Taynton,  on  his  arrival  back  at 
Brighton  that  afternoon,  devoted  a 
couple  of  solitary  hours  to  such 
thoughts  as  these,  and  others  to  which 
this  tragedy  naturally  gave  rise  and 
then  with  a  supreme  effort  of  will 
he  determined  to  think  no  more  on 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     201 

the  subject.  It  was  inevitable  that 
his  mind  should  again  and  again 
perhaps  for  weeks  and  months  to  come 
fall  back  on  these  dreadful  events, 
but  his  will  was  set  on  not  permitting 
himself  to  dwell  on  them.  So,  though 
it  was  already  late  in  the  afternoon, 
he  set  forth  again  from  his  house  about 
tea-time,  to  spend  a  couple  of  hours 
at  the  office.  He  had  sent  word  to 
Mr.  Timmins  that  he  would  probably 
come  in,  and  begin  to  get  through  the 
arrears  caused  by  his  unavoidable 
absence  that  morning,  and  he  found 
his  head  clerk  waiting  for  him.  A 
few  words  were  of  course  appropriate, 
and  they  were  admirably  chosen. 

"You  have  seen  the  result  of  the 
inquest,  no  doubt,  Mr.  Timmins," 
he  said,  "and  yet  one  hardly  knows 
whether  one  wishes  the  murderer  to  be 
brought  to  justice.  What  good  does 
that  do,  now  our  friend  is  dead?  So 
mean  and  petty  a  motive  too;   just 


202      T?IE  RLOTTING  BOOK 

for  a  watch  and  a  few  sovereigns.  It 
was  money  bought  at  a  terrible  price, 
was  it  not?  Poor  soul,  poor  soul; 
yes,  I  say  that  of  the  murderer.  Well, 
well,  we  must  turn  our  faces  fonvard, 
Mr.  Timmins;  it  is  no  use  dwelling  on 
the  dreadful  irremediable  past.  The 
morning's  post?     Is  that  it?" 

Mr.  Timmins  ventured  sympathy. 

"You  look  terribly  worn  out,  sir," 
he  said.  "Woukin't  it  be  wiser  to 
leave  it  till  to-morrow?  A  good 
night's  rest,  you  know,  sir,  if  you  '11 
excuse  my  mentioning  it." 

"No,  no,  Mr.  Timmins,  we  must  get 
to  work  again,  we  must  get  to  work." 

Nature,  inspired  by  the  spirit  and 
instinct  of  life,  is  wonderfully  recupera- 
tive. Whether  earthquake  or  famine, 
fire  or  pestilence  has  blotted  out  a 
thousand  lives,  those  who  are  left, 
like  ants  when  their  house  is  disturbed, 
waste  but  little  time  after  the  damage 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     203 

has  been  done  in  vain  lamentations, 
but,  slaves  to  the  force  of  life, 
begin  almost  instantly  to  rebuild 
and  reconstruct.  And  what  is  true 
of  the  community  is  true  also  of  the 
individual,  and  thus  in  three  days  from 
this  dreadful  morning  of  the  inquest, 
Mr.  Taynton,  after  attending  the  funeral 
of  the  murdered  man,  was  very 
actively  employed,  since  the  branch  of 
the  firm  in  London,  deprived  of  its 
head,  required  supervision  from  him. 
Others  also,  who  had  been  brought 
near  to  the  tragedy,  were  occupied 
again,  and  of  these  Morris  in  particular 
was  a  fair  example  of  the  spirit  of 
the  Life-force.  His  effort,  no  doubt, 
was  in  a  way  easier  than  that  made  by 
Mr.  Taynton,  for  to  be  twenty- two  years 
old  and  in  love  should  be  occupation 
sufficient.  But  he,  too,  had  his  bad 
hours,  when  the  past  rose  phantom- 
like about  him,  and  he  recalled  that 
evening  when  his  rage  had  driven  him 


204      THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

nearly  mad  with  passion  against  his 
traducer.  And  by  an  awful  coinci- 
dence, his  madness  had  been  contem- 
poraneous with  the  slanderer's  death. 
He  must,  in  fact,  have  been  within  a 
few  hundred  yards  of  the  place  at 
the  time  the  murder  was  committed, 
for  he  had  gone  back  to  Falmer  Park 
that  day,  with  the  message  that  Mr. 
Ta>Titon  would  call  on  the  morrow,  and 
had  left  the  place  not  half  an  hour 
before  the  breaking  of  the  storm.  He 
had  driven  by  the  comer  of  the  Park, 
where  the  path  over  the  downs  left 
the  main  road  and  within  a  few 
hundred  yards  of  him  at  that  moment, 
had  been,  dead  or  alive,  the  man  who 
had  so  vilely  slandered  him.  Suppos- 
ing —  it  might  so  easily  have  happened 
—  they  had  met  on  the  road.  What 
would  he  have  done.?  Would  he  hav^e 
been  able  to  pass  him  and  not  wreaked 
his  rage  on  him?  He  hardly  dared 
to  think  of  that.     But,  life  and  love 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     205 

were  his,  and  that  which  might  have 
been  was  soon  dreamlike  in  comparison 
of  these.  Indeed,  that  dreadful  dream 
which  he  had  had  the  night  after  the 
murder  had  been  committed  was  no 
less  real  than  it.  The  past  was  all  of 
this  texture,  and  mistlike,  it  was 
evaporated  in  the  beams  of  the  day 
that  was  his. 

Now  Brighton  is  a  populous  place, 
and  a  sunny  one,  and  many  people 
lounge  there  in  the  sun  all  day.  But 
for  the  next  three  or  four  days  a  few  of 
these  loungers  lounged  somewhat  sys- 
tematically. One  lounged'  in  Sussex 
Square,  another  lounged  in  Montpellier 
Road,  one  or  two  others  who  appar- 
ently enjoyed  this  fresh  air  but  did  not 
care  about  the  towTi  itself,  usually 
went  to  the  station  after  breakfast, 
and  spent  the  day  in  rambling  agree- 
ably about  the  downs.  They  also 
frequented  the  pleasant  little  village  of 
Falmer,  gossiping  freely  with  its  rural 


2o6     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

inhabitants.  Often  footmen  or  gar- 
deners from  the  Park  came  down  to 
the  village,  and  acquaintances  were 
easily  ripened  in  the  ale-house.  Other- 
wise there  was  not  much  incident 
in  the  village;  sometimes  a  motor  drove 
by,  and  one,  after  an  illegally  fast  pro- 
gress along  the  road,  very  often  turned 
in  at  the  park  gates.  But  no  prosecution 
followed;  it  was  clear  they  were  not 
agents  of  the  police.  Mr.  Figgis,  also, 
frequently  came  out  from  Brighton, 
and  went  strolling  about  too,  very 
slowly  and  sadh'.  He  often  wandered 
in  the  little  copses  that  bordered  the 
path  over  the  downs  to  Brighton, 
especially  near  the  place  where  it  joined 
the  main  road  a  few  hundred  yards  below 
Falmer  station.  Then  came  a  morn- 
ing when  neither  he  nor  any  of  the 
other  chance  visitors  to  Falmer  were 
seen  there  any  more.  But  the  evening 
before  Mr.  Figgis  carried  back  with 
him  to  the  train  a  long  thin  package 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      207 

wrapped  in  brown  paper.  But  on  the 
morning  when  these  strangers  were 
seen  no  more  at  Palmer,  it  appeared 
that  they  had  not  entirely  left  the 
neighbourhood,  for  instead  of  one  only 
being  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Sussex 
Square,  there  were  three  of  them 
there. 

Morris  had  ordered  the  motor  to  be 
round  that  morning  at  eleven,  and  it 
had  been  at  the  door  some  few  minutes 
before  he  appeared.  Martin  had 
driven  it  round  from  the  stables,  but 
he  was  in  a  suit  of  tweed;  it  seemed 
that  he  was  not  going  with  it.  Then 
the  front  door  opened,  and  Morris 
appeared  as  usual  in  a  violent  hurry. 
One  of  the  strangers  was  on  the  pave- 
ment close  to  the  house  door,  looking 
with  interest  at  the  car.  But  his 
interest  in  the  car  ceased  when  the  boy 
appeared.  And  from  the  railings  of 
the  square  garden  opposite  another 
stranger  crossed  the  road,   and  from 


2o8     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

the  left  behind  the  car  came  a  third. 

"Mr.  Morris  Assheton?"  said  the 
first. 

"Well,  what  then?"  asked  Morris. 

The  two  others  moved  a  little 
nearer. 

"I  arrest  you  in  the  King's  name," 
said  the  first. 

Morris  was  putting  on  a  light  coat 
as  he  came  across  the  pavement.  One 
arm  was  in,  the  other  out.  He  stopped 
dead;  and  the  bright  colour  of  his  face 
slowly  faded,  leaving  a  sort  of  ashen 
gray  behind.  His  mouth  suddenly 
went  dry,  and  it  was  only  at  the  third 
attempt  to  speak  that  words  came. 

"What  for?"  he  said. 

"For  the  murder  of  Godfrey  Mills," 
said  the  man.  "Here  is  the  warrant. 
I  warn  you  that  all  you  say ' ' 

Morris,  whose  lithe  athletic  frame 
had  gone  slack  for  the  moment, 
stiffened  himself  up  again. 

"I  am  not  going  to  say  anything," 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     209 

he  said.  "Martin,  drive  to  Mr. 
Taynton's  at  once,  and  tell  him  that  I 
am  arrested." 

The  other  two  now  had  closed 
round  him. 

"Oh,  I'm  not  going  to  bolt,"  he 
said.  "Please  tell  me  where  you  are 
going  to  take  me." 

"Police  Court  in  Branksome  Street," 
said  the  first. 

"Tell  Mr.  Taynton  I  am  there,"  said 
Morris  to  his  man. 

There  was  a  cab  at  the  comer  of 
the  square,  and  in  answer  to  an 
almost  imperceptible  nod  from  one  of 
the  men,  it  moved  up  to  the  house. 
The  square  was  otherwise  nearly 
empty,  and  Morris  looked  round  as  the 
cab  drew  nearer.  Upstairs  in  the 
house  he  had  just  left,  was  his  mother 
who  was  coming  out  to  Palmer  this 
evening  to  dine;  above  illimitable  blue 
stretched  from  horizon  to  horizon, 
behind  was  the  free  fresh  sea.     Birds 


2IO     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

chirped  in  the  bushes  and  Hlac  was  in 
flower.     Everything  had  its  hberty. 

Then  a  new  instinct  seized  him,  and 
though  a  moment  before  he  had  given 
his  word  that  he  was  not  meditating 
escape,  Uberty  called  to  him.  Every- 
thing else  was  free.  He  rushed  for- 
ward, striking  right  and  left  with  his 
arms,  then  tripped  on  the  edge  of  the 
paving  stones  and  fell.  He  was  in- 
stantly seized,  and  next  moment  was 
in  the  cab,  and  fetters  of  steel,  though 
he  could  not  remember  their  having 
been  placed  there,  were  on  his  wrists. 


CHAPTER  X 

IT  WAS  a  fortnight  later,  a  hot  July 
morning,  and  an  unusual  anima- 
tion reigned  in  the  staid  and  leisurely 
streets  of  Lewes.  For  the  Assizes 
opened  that  day,  and  it  was  known 
that  the  first  case  to  be  tried  was  the 
murder  of  which  all  Brighton  and  a 
large  part  of  England  had  been  talking 
so  much  since  Morris  Assheton  had 
been  committed  for  trial.  At  the  hear- 
ing in  the  police-court  there  was  not 
very  much  evidence  brought  forward, 
but  there  had  been  sufficient  to  make 
it  necessary  that  he  should  stand  his 
trial.  It  was  known,  for  instance, 
that  he  had  some  very  serious 
reason  for  anger  and  resentment 
against  his  victim;  those  who  had  seen 
him  that  day  remembered  him  as  being 

211 


2  12     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

utterly  unlike  himself;  he  was  known 
to  have  been  at  Falmer  Park  that 
afternoon  about  six,  and  to  have 
driven  home  along  the  Falmer  Road 
in  his  car  an  hour  or  so  later.  And 
in  a  copse  close  by  to  where  the  body  of 
the  murdered  man  was  found  had  been 
discovered  a  thick  bludgeon  of  a  stick, 
broken  it  would  seem  by  some  violent 
act,  into  two  halves.  On  the  top  half 
was  rudely  cut  with  a  pen-knife 
M.  ASSHE  .  .  .  What  was  puz- 
zling, however,  was  the  apparent 
motive  of  robbery  about  the  crime; 
it  will  be  remembered  that  the  victim's 
watch  was  missing,  and  that  no  money 
was  found  on  him. 

But  since  Morris  had  been  brought 
up  for  committal  at  the  police-court 
it  was  believed  that  a  quantity  more 
evidence  of  a  peculiarly  incriminating 
kind  had  turned  up.  Yet  in  spite 
of  this,  so  it  was  rumoured,  the  prisoner 
apparently   did   more   than   bear   up; 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     213 

it  was  said  that  he  was  quite  cheerful, 
quite  confident  that  his  innocence 
would  be  established.  Others  said 
that  he  was  merely  callous  and  utterly 
without  any  moral  sense.  Much  sym- 
pathy of  course  was  felt  for  his  mother, 
and  even  more  for  the  family  of  the 
Templetons  and  the  daughter  to  whom 
it  was  said  that  Morris  was  actually 
engaged.  And,  as  much  as  anyone  it 
was  Mr.  Taynton  who  was  the  recipient 
of  the  respectful  pity  of  the  British 
public.  Though  no  relation  he  had  all 
his  life  been  a  father  to  Morris,  and 
while  Miss  Madge  Templeton  was 
young  and  had  the  spring  and  elasticity 
of  youth,  so  that,  though  all  this  was 
indeed  terrible  enough,  she  might  be 
expected  to  get  over  it,  Mr.  Taynton 
was  advanced  in  years  and  it  seemed 
that  he  was  utterly  broken  by  the 
shock.  He  had  not  been  in  Brighton 
on  the  day  on  which  Morris  was 
brought  before  the  police-court   mag- 


214     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

istrates,  and  the  news  had  reached 
him  in  London  after  his  young  friend 
had  been  committed.  It  was  said  he 
had  fainted  straight  off,  and  there  had 
been  much  difficulty  in  bringing  him 
round.  But  since  then  he  had  worked 
day  and  night  on  behalf  of  the  accused. 
But  certain  fresh  evidence  which  had 
turned  up  a  day  or  two  before  the 
Assizes  seemed  to  have  taken  the 
heart  out  of  him.  He  had  felt  confi- 
dent that  the  watch  would  have  been 
found,  and  the  thief  traced.  But 
something  new  that  had  turned  up  had 
utterly  staggered  him.  He  could  only 
cling  to  one  hope,  and  that  was  that 
he  knew  the  evidence  about  the  stick 
must  break  down,  for  it  was  he  who  had 
thrown  the  fragments  into  the  bushes, 
a  fact  which  w^ould  come  to  light  in 
his  own  evidence.  But  at  the  most, 
all  he  could  hope  for  w^as,  that  though 
it  seemed  as  if  the  poor  lad  must  be 
condemned,  the  jury,  on  account  of  his 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     215 

youth,  and  the  provocation  he  had 
received,  of  which  Mr.  Taynton  would 
certainly  make  the  most  when  called 
upon  to  bear  witness  on  this  point,  or 
owing  to  some  weakness  in  the  terrible 
chain  of  evidence  that  had  been  woven, 
would  recommend  him  to  mercy. 

The  awful  formalities  at  the  opening 
of  the  case  were  gone  through.  The 
judge  took  his  seat,  and  laid  on  the 
bench  in  front  of  him  a  small  parcel 
wrapped  up  in  tissue  paper;  the  jury 
was  sworn  in,  and  the  prisoner  asked 
if  he  objected  to  the  inclusion  of  any 
of  those  among  the  men  who  were 
going  to  decide  whether  he  was  worthy 
of  life  or  guilty  of  death,  and  the 
packed  court,  composed  about  equally 
of  men  and  women,  most  of  whom 
would  have  shuddered  to  see  a  dog 
beaten,  or  a  tired  hare  made  to  go 
an  extra  mile,  settled  themselves  in 
their  places  with  a  rustle  of  satis- 
faction at  the  thought  of  seeing  a  man 


2i6     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

brought  before  them  in  the  shame  of 
suspected  murder,  and  promised  them- 
selves an  interesting  and  thriUing 
couple  of  days  in  observing  the  gallows 
march  nearer  him,  and  in  watching 
his  mental  agony.  They  who  would, 
and  perhaps  did,  subscribe  to  bene- 
volent institutions  for  the  relief  of 
suffering  among  the  lower  animals, 
would  willingly  have  paid  a  far  higher 
rate  to  observe  the  suffering  of  a  man. 
He  was  so  interesting;  he  was  so  young 
and  good-looking;  what  a  depraved 
monster  he  must  be.  And  that  little 
package  in  tissue  paper  which  the 
judge  brought  in  and  laid  on  the 
bench!  The  black  cap,  was  it  not? 
That  showed  what  the  judge  thought 
about  it  all.     How  thrilling! 

Counsel  for  the  Crown,  opened  the 
case,  and  in  a  speech  grimly  devoid  of  all 
emotional  appeal,  laid  before  the  court 
the  facts  he  was  prepared  to  prove,  on 
which  they  would  base  their  verdict. 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     217 

The  prisoner,  a  young  man  of  birth 
and  breeding,  had,  strong  grounds  for 
revenge  on  the  murdered  man.  The 
prosecution,  however,  was  not  con- 
cerned in  defending  what  the  murdered 
man  had  done,  but  in  estabhshing  the 
guilt  of  the  man  who  had  murdered 
him.  Godfrey  Mills,  had,  as  could  be 
proved  by  witnesses,  slandered  the 
prisoner  in  an  abominable  manner, 
and  the  prosecution  were  not  in- 
tending for  a  moment  to  attempt 
to  establish  the  truth  of  his  slander. 
But  this  slander  they  put  forward  as  a 
motive  that  gave  rise  to  a  murderous 
impulse  on  the  part  of  the  prisoner. 
The  jury  would  hear  from  one  of  the 
witnesses,  an  old  friend  of  the  pris- 
oner's, and  a  man  who  had  been  a  sort 
of  father  to  him,  that  a  few  hours  only 
before  the  murder  was  committed  the 
prisoner  had  uttered  certain  words 
which  admitted  only  of  one  interpre- 
tation,  namely   that   murder   was   in 


2i8       THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

his  mind.  That  the  provocation  was 
great  was  not  denied;  it  was  certain 
however,  that  the  provocation  was 
sufficient. 

Counsel  then  sketched  the  actual  cir- 
cumstances of  the  crime,  as  far  as  they 
could  be  constructed  from  what  evi- 
dence there  was.  This  evidence  was 
purely  circumstantial,  but  of  a  sort 
which  left  no  reasonable  doubt  that 
the  murder  had  been  committed  by  the 
prisoner  in  the  manner  suggested.  Mr. 
Godfrey  Mills  had  gone  to  London  on 
the  Tuesday  of  the  fatal  week,  intend- 
ing to  return  on  the  Thursday.  On 
the  Wednesday  the  prisoner  became 
cognisant  of  the  fact  that  Mr.  Godfrey 
Mills  had  —  he  would  not  argue  over 
it  —  wantonly  slandered  him  to  Sir 
Richard  Templeton,  a  marriage  with 
the  daughter  of  whom  was  projected 
in  the  prisoner's  mind,  which  there  was 
reason  to  suppose,  might  have  taken 
place.     Should  the  jury  not  be  satisfied 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK     219 

on  that  point,  witnesses  would  be 
called,  including  the  young  lady  her- 
self, but  unless  the  counsel  for  the 
defence  challenged  their  statement, 
namely  that  this  slander  had  been 
spoken  which  contributed,  so  it  was 
argued,  a  motive  for  the  crime  it 
would  be  unnecessary  to  intrude  on 
the  poignant  and  private  grief  of 
persons  so  situated,  and  to  insist  on 
a  scene  which  must  prove  to  be  so 
heart-rendingly  painful. 

(There  was  a  slight  movement  of 
demur  in  the  humane  and  crowded 
court  at  this;  it  was  just  these  heart- 
rendingly  painful  things  which  were 
so  thrilling.) 

It  was  most  important,  continued 
counsel  for  the  prosecution  that 
the  jury  should  fix  these  dates  accur- 
ately in  their  minds.  Tuesday  was 
June  2ist;  it  was  on  that  day  the 
murdered  man  had  gone  to  London, 
designing  to  return  on  June  23d,  Thurs- 


220    THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

day.  The  prisoner  had  learned  on 
Wednesday  (June  2  2d)  that  aspersions 
had  been  made,  false  aspersions,  on  his 
character,  and  it  was  on  Thursday 
that  he  learned  for  certain  from  the 
lips  of  the  man  to  whom  they  had  been 
made,  who  was  the  author  of  them. 
The  author  was  Mr.  Godfrey  Mills.  He 
had  thereupon  motored  back  from  Pal- 
mer Park,  and  informed  Mr.  Ta>Titon 
of  this,  and  had  left  again  for  Palmer 
an  hour  later  to  make  an  appointment 
for  Mr.  Taynton  to  see  Sir  Richard.  He 
knew,  too,  this  would  be  proved,  that 
Mr.  Godfrey  Mills  proposed  to  return 
from  London  that  afternoon,  to  get  out 
at  Palmer  station  and  walk  back  to 
Brighton.  It  was  certain  from  the  find- 
ing of  the  body  that  Mr.  Mills  had  trav- 
elled from  London,  as  he  intended,  and 
that  he  had  got  out  at  this  station. 
It  was  certain  also  that  at  that 
hour  the  prisoner,  burning  for  venge- 
ance,   and   knowing    the    movements 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       221 

of    Mr.  Mills,   was   in   the  vicinity  of 
Falmer. 

To  proceed,  it  was  certain  also  that 
the  prisoner  in  a  very  strange  wild 
state  had  arrived  at  Mr.  Taynton's 
house  about  nine  that  evening,  know- 
ing that  Mr.  Mills  was  expected  there 
at  about  9.30.  Granted  that  he  had 
committed  the  murder,  this  proceed- 
ing was  dictated  by  the  most  elemen- 
tary instinct  of  self-preservation.  It  was 
also  in  accordance  with  that  that  he  had 
gone  round  in  the  pelting  rain  late  that 
night  to  see  if  the  missing  man  had 
returned  to  his  fiat,  and  that  he  had 
gone  to  London  next  morning  to  seek 
him  there.  He  had  not,  of  course, 
found  him,  and  he  returned  to  Brighton 
that  afternoon.  In  connection  with 
this  return,  another  painful  passage 
lay  before  them,  for  it  would  be  shown 
by  one  of  the  witnesses  that  again 
on  the  Friday  afternoon  the  prisoner 
had  visited   the  scene  of  the  crime. 


222     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

Mr.  Taynton,  in  fact,  still  unsuspicious 
of  anything  being  wrong  had  walked 
over  the  Downs  that  afternoon  from 
Brighton  to  Palmer,  and  had  sat  down 
in  view  of  the  station  where  he  pro- 
posed to  catch  a  train  back  to  Brighton, 
and  had  seen  the  prisoner  stop  his 
motor-car  close  to  the  comer  where 
the  body  had  been  found,  and  behave 
in  a  manner  inexplicable  except  on 
the  theory  that  he  knew  where  the 
body  lay.  Subsequently  to  the  finding 
of  the  body,  which  had  occurred  on 
Saturday  evening,  there  had  been 
discovered  in  a  coppice  adjoining  a 
heavy  bludgeon-like  stick  broken  in 
two.  The  top  of  it,  which  would  be 
produced,  bore  the  inscription  M. 
ASSHE     .     .     . 

Mr.  Taynton  was  present  in  court, 
and  was  sitting  on  the  bench  to  the 
right  of  the  judge  who  had  long  been 
a  personal  friend  of  his.  Hitherto  his 
face  had  been  hidden   in  his  hands, 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      223 

as  this  terribly  logical  tale  went  on. 
But  here  he  raised  it,  and  smiled,  a 
wan  smile  enough,  at  Morris.  The 
latter  did  not  seem  to  notice  the  action. 
Counsel  for  the  prosecution  continued. 
All  this,  he  said,  had  been  brought 
forward  at  the  trial  before  the  police- 
court  magistrates,  and  he  thought  the 
jury  would  agree  that  it  was  more 
than  sufficient  to  commit  the  prisoner 
to  trial.  At  that  trial,  too,  they  had 
heard,  the  whole  world  had  heard,  of 
the  mystery  of  the  missing  watch, 
and  the  missing  money.  No  money, 
at  least,  had  been  found  on  the  body; 
it  was  reasonable  to  refer  to  it  as 
"missing."  But  here  again,  the 
motive  of  self-preservation  came  in; 
the  whole  thing  had  been  carefully 
planned ;  the  prisoner ,  counsel  suggested, 
had,  just  as  he  had  gone  up  to 
town  to  find  Mr.  Mills  the  day 
after  the  murder  was  committed, 
striven  to  put  justice  off  the  scent  in 


224     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

making  it  appear  that  the  motive  for 
the  crime,  had  been  robbery.  With 
well-calculated  cunning  he  had  taken 
the  watch  and  what  coins  there  were, 
from  the  pockets  of  his  victim.  That 
at  any  rate  was  the  theory  suggested 
by  the  prosecution. 

The  speech  was  admirably  delivered, 
and  its  virtue  was  its  extreme  impas- 
siveness;  it  seemed  quite  impersonal, 
the  mere  automatic  action  of  justice,  not 
revengeful,  not  seeking  for  death,  but 
merely  stating  the  case  as  it  might  be 
stated  by  some  planet  or  remote  fixed 
star.  Then  there  was  a  short  pause, 
while  the  prosecutor  for  the  Crown 
laid  down  his  notes.  And  the  same 
slow,  clear,  impassive  voice  went  on. 

"But  since  the  committal  of  the 
prisoner  to  stand  his  trial  at  these 
assizes,"  he  said,  "more  evidence  of  an 
utterly  unexpected,  but  to  us  convinc- 
ing kind  has  been  discovered.  Here  it 
is."     And    he    held    up    a    sheet    of 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      225 

blotting  paper,  and  a  crumpled 
envelope. 

"A  letter  has  been  blotted  on  this 
sheet,"  he  said,  "and  by  holding  it  up 
to  the  light  and  looking  through  it, 
one  can,  of  course,  read  what  was 
written.  But  before  I  read  it,  I  will 
tell  you  from  where  this  sheet  was 
taken.  It  was  taken  from  a  blotting 
book  in  the  drawing-room  of  Mrs. 
Assheton's  house  in  Sussex  Square. 
An  expert  in  handwriting  will  soon 
tell  the  gentlemen  of  the  jury  in  whose 
hand  he  without  doubt  considers  it  to 
be  written.  After  the  committal  of 
the  prisoner  to  trial,  search  was  of 
course  made  in  this  house,  for  further 
evidence.  This  evidence  was  almost 
immediately  discovered.  After  that 
no  further  search  was  made." 

The  judge  looked  up  from  his  notes. 

"By  whom  was  this  discovery 
made?"  he  asked. 

"By  Superintendent  Figgis  and  Ser- 


226     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

geant  Wilkinson,  my  lord.  They  will 
give  their  evidence." 

He  waited  till  the  judge  had  entered 
this. 

"I  will  read  the  letter,"  he  said, 
"from  the  negative,  so  to  speak,  of  the 
blotting  paper." 

June  2ist. 
To  Godfrey  Mills,  Esq. 

You  damned  brute,  I  will  settle  you. 
I  hear  you  are  coming  back  to  Brighton 
to-morrow,  and  are  getting  out  at  Palmer. 
All  right;  I  shall  be  there,  and  we  shall 
have  a  talk. 

Morris  Assheton. 

A  sort  of  purr  went  round  the 
court;  the  kind  humane  ladies  and 
gentlemen  who  had  fought  for  seats 
found  this  to  their  taste.  The  noose 
tightened. 

"I  have  here  also  an  envelope," 
said  the  prosecutor,  *  *  which  was  found 
by  Mr.  Figgis  and  Mr.  Wilkinson  in 
the  waste-paper  basket  in  the  sitting- 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      227 

room  of  the  deceased.  According  to 
the  expert  in  handwriting,  whose 
evidence  you  will  hear,  it  is  undoubt- 
edly addressed  by  the  same  hand  that 
wrote  the  letter  I  have  just  read  you. 
And,  in  his  opinion,  the  handwriting 
is  that  of  the  prisoner.  No  letter 
was  found  in  the  deceased  man's  room 
corresponding  to  this  envelope,  but 
the  jury  will  observe  that  what  I 
have  called  the  negative  of  the  letter 
on  the  blotting-paper  was  dated  June 
2ist,  the  day  that  the  prisoner  sus- 
pected the  slander  that  had  been 
levelled  at  him.  The  suggestion  is 
that  the  deceased  opened  this  before 
leaving  for  London,  and  took  the 
letter  with  him.  And  the  hand,  that 
for  the  purposes  of  misleading  justice, 
robbed  him  of  his  watch  and  his 
money,  also  destroyed  the  letter  which 
was  then  on  his  person,  and  which 
was  an  incriminating  document.  But 
this    sheet    of    blotting    paper    is    as 


228     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

valuable  as  the  letter  itself.     It  proves 
the  letter  to  have  been  written." 

Morris  had  been  given  a  seat  in  the 
dock,  and  on  each  side  of  him  there 
stood  a  prison-warder.  But  in  the 
awed  hush  that  followed,  for  the 
vultures  and  carrion  crows  who 
crowded  the  court  were  finding  them- 
selves quite  beautifully  thrilled,  he 
wrote  a  few  words  on  a  slip  of  paper 
and  handed  it  to  a  w^arder  to  give  to 
his  counsel.  And  his  counsel  nodded 
to  him. 

The  opening  speech  for  the  Crown 
had  lasted  something  over  two  hours, 
and  a  couple  of  witnesses  only  w-ere 
called  before  the  interval  for  lunch. 
But  most  of  the  human  ghouls  had 
brought  sandwiches  with  them,  and 
the  court  was  packed  with  the  same 
people  when  Morris  was  brought  up 
again  after  the  interval,  and  the  judge, 
breathing  sherry,  took  his  seat.     The 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       229 

court  had  become  terribly  hot,  but 
the  pubUc  were  too  humane  to  mind 
that.  A  criminal  was  being  chased 
toward  the  gallows,  and  they  followed 
his  progress  there  with  breathless 
interest.  Step  by  step  all  that  was 
laid  down  in  the  opening  speech  for 
the  prosecution  was  inexorably  proved, 
all,  that  is  to  say,  except  the  affair  of 
the  stick.  But  from  what  a  certain 
witness  (Mr.  Taynton)  swore  to,  it  was 
clear  that  this  piece  of  circumstantial 
evidence,  which  indeed  was  of  the  great- 
est importance  since  the  Crown's  case 
was  that  the  murder  had  been  com- 
mitted with  that  bludgeon  of  a  stick, 
completely  broke  down.  Whoever  had 
done  the  murder,  he  had  not  done  it 
with  that  stick,  since  Mr.  Taynton 
deposed  to  having  been  at  Mrs.  As- 
sheton's  house  on  the  Friday,  the  day 
after  the  murder  had  been  committed, 
and  to  having  taken  the  stick  away  by 
mistake,  believing  it  to  be  his.     And 


230     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

the  counsel  for  the  defence  only  asked 
one  question  on  this  point,  which 
question  closed  the  proceedings  for 
the  day.     It  was: 

"You  have  a  similar  stick  then?" 
And    Mr.   Taynton    replied    in   the 
affirmative. 

The  court  then  rose. 

On  the  whole  the  day  had  been  most 
satisfactory^  to  the  ghouls  and  vultures 
and  it  seemed  probable  that  they 
would  have  equally  exciting  and  plenti- 
ful fare  next  day.  But  in  the  opinion 
of  many  Morris's  counsel  was  dis- 
appointing. He  did  not  cross- 
examine  witnesses  at  all  sensationally, 
and  drag  out  dreadful  secrets  (which 
had  nothing  to  do  with  the  case) 
about  their  private  lives,  in  order  to 
show  that  they  seldom  if  ever  spoke 
the  truth.  Indeed,  witness  after  wit- 
ness was  allowed  to  escape  without  any 
cross-examination  at  all;  there  was  no 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      231 

attempt  made  to  prove  that  the  car- 
penter who  had  found  the  body  had 
been  himself  tried  for  murder,  or  that 
his  children  were  illegitimate.  Yet 
gradually,  as  the  afternoon  went  on, 
a  sort  of  impression  began  to  make  its 
way,  that  there  was  something  coming 
which  no  one  suspected. 

The  next  morning  those  impressions 
were  realised  when  the  adjourned 
cross-examination  of  Mr.  Taynton  was 
resumed.  The  counsel  for  the  defence 
made  an  immediate  attack  on  the 
theories  of  the  prosecution,  and  it  told. 
For  the  prosecution  had  suggested 
that  Morris's  presence  at  the  scene  of 
the  murder  the  day  after  was  suspi- 
cious, as  if  he  had  come  back  uneasily 
and  of  an  unquiet  conscience.  If  that 
was  so,  Mr.  Taynton' s  presence  there, 
who  had  been  the  witness  who  proved 
the  presence  of  the  other,  was  suspic- 
cious  also.  What  had  he  come  there 
for?      In  order  to  throw  the  broken 


232     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

pieces  of  Morris's  stick  into  the  bushes? 
These  inferences  were  of  course  but  sug- 
gested in  the  questions  counsel  asked 
Mr.  Taynton  in  the  further  cross-exami- 
nation of  this  morning,  and  perhaps  no 
one  in  court  saw  what  the  suggestion 
was  for  a  moment  or  two,  so  subtly 
and  covertly  was  it  conveyed.  Then 
it  appeared  to  strike  all  minds  together, 
and  a  subdued  rustle  went  round  the 
court,  followed  the  moment  after  by 
an  even  intenser  silence. 

Then  followed  a  series  of  interroga- 
tions, which  at  first  seemed  wholly 
irrelevant,  for  they  appeared  to  bear 
only  on  the  business  relations  between 
the  prisoner  and  the  witness.  Then 
suddenly  like  the  dim  light  at  the  end 
of  a  tunnel,  where  shines  the  pervading 
illuminating  sunlight,  a  little  ray 
dawned. 

"You  have  had  control  of  the 
prisoner's  private  fortune  since  1886?" 

''Yes." 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       233 

"In  the  year  1896  he  had  £8,000 
or  thereabouts  in  London  and  North- 
western Debentures,  ;^6,ooo  in  Consols, 
;!{^7,ooo  in  Government  bonds  of  South 
Australia?" 

"I  have  no  doubt  those  figures  are 
correct." 

"A  fortnight  ago  you  bought  ;;^8,ooo 
of  London  and  North- Western  Deben- 
tures, ;i^6,ooo  in  Consols,  ;^7,ooo  in  Gov- 
emraent  bonds  of  South  Australia?" 

Mr.  Taynton  opened  his  lips  to  speak, 
but  no  sound  came  from  them. 

"Please  answer  the  question." 

If  there  had  been  a  dead  hush  before, 
succeeding  the  rustle  that  had  followed 
the  suggestions  about  the  stick,  a 
silence  far  more  palpable  now  de- 
scended. There  was  no  doubt  as  to 
what  the  suggestion  was  now. 

The  counsel  for  the  prosecution 
broke  in. 

"I  submit  that  these  questions  are 
irrelevant,  my  lord,"  he  said. 


234    THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

' '  I  shall  subsequently  show,  my 
lord,  that  they  are  not." 

' '  The  witness  must  answer  the  ques- 
tion," said  the  judge.  "I  see  that 
there  is  a  possible  relevancy." 

The  question  was  answered. 

"Thank  you,  that  is  all,"  said  the 
counsel  for  the  defence,  and  Mr.  Taynton 
left  the  witness  box. 

It  was  then,  for  the  first  time  since 
the  trial  began,  that  Morris  looked  at 
this  witness.  All  through  he  had 
been  perfectly  calm  and  collected,  a 
circumstance  which  the  spectators  put 
down  to  the  callousness  with  which 
they  kindly  credited  him,  and  now  for 
the  first  time,  as  Mr.  Taynton's  eyes 
and  his  met,  an  emotion  crossed  the 
prisoner's  face.     He  looked  sorry. 


CHAPTER  XI 

FOR  the  rest  of  the  morning  the 
examination  of  witnesses  for  the 
prosecution  went  on,  for  there  were 
a  very  large  number  of  them,  but 
when  the  court  rose  for  lunch,  the 
counsel  for  the  prosecution  intimated 
that  this  was  his  last.  But  again, 
hardly  any  but  those  engaged  officially, 
the  judge,  the  counsel,  the  prisoner, 
the  warder,  left  the  court.  Mr. 
Taynton,  however,  went  home,  for  he 
had  his  seat  on  the  bench,  and  he 
could  escape  for  an  hour  from  this 
very  hot  and  oppressive  atmosphere. 
But  he  did  not  go  to  his  Lewes  office, 
or  to  any  hotel  to  get  his  lunch.  He 
went  to  the  station,  where  after  waiting 
some  quarter  of  an  hour,  he  took  the 
train    to    Brighton.     The    train    ran 

235 


236    THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

through  Falmer  and  from  his  window 
he  could  see  where  the  Park  palings 
made  an  angle  close  to  the  road;  it 
was  from  there  that  the  path  over  the 
Downs,  where  he  had  so  often  walked, 
passed  to  Brighton. 

Again  the  judge  took  his  seat,  still 
carrying  the  little  parcel  wrapped  up 
in  tissue  paper. 

There  was  no  need  for  the  usher  to 
call  silence,  for  the  silence  was  granted 
without  being  asked  for. 

The  counsel  for  the  defence  called 
the  first  witness;  he  also  unwrapped 
a  flat  parcel  which  he  had  brought 
into  court  with  him,  and  handed  it  to 
the  witness. 

"That  was  supplied  by  your  firm?" 

"Yes  sir." 

"Who  ordered  it?" 

"Mr.  Assheton." 

"Mr.  Morris  Assheton,  that  is.  Did 
he  order  it  from  you,  you  yourself?" 

"Yes,  sir." 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      237 

"Did  he  give  any  specific  in- 
structions about  it?" 

"Yes,  sir." 

"What  were  they?" 

"That  the  blotting  book  which  Mrs. 
Assheton  had  already  ordered  v/as  to 
be  countermanded,  and  that  this  was 
to  be  sent  in  its  stead  on  June  24th." 

"You  mean  not  after  June  24th?" 

"No,  sir;  the  instructions  were  that 
it  was  not  to  be  sent  before  June  24th." 

"Why  was  that?" 

"I  could  not  say,  sir.  Those  were 
the  instructions." 

"And  it  was  sent  on  June  24th." 

"Yes,  sir.  It  was  entered  in  our 
book." 

The  book  in  question  was  produced 
and  handed  to  the  jury  and  the  judge. 

"That    is    all,"    Mrs.  Assheton." 

She  stepped  into  the  box,  and 
smiled  at  Morris.  There  was  no  mur- 
mur of  sympathy,  no  rustling;  the 
whole  thing  was  too  tense. 


238    THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

"You  returned  home  on  June  24th 
last,  from  a  visit  to  town?" 

"Yes." 

"At  what  time?" 

"I  could  not  say  to  the  minute. 
But  about  eleven  in  the  morning.'  ' 

"You  found  letters  waiting  for  you  ?" 

"Yes." 

"Anything  else?" 

"A  parcel." 

"What  did  it  contain?" 

"A  blotting-book.  It  was  a  present 
from  my  son  on  my  birthday." 

"Is  this  the  blotting-book?" 

"Yes." 

"What  did  you  do  with  it?" 

"I  opened  it  and  placed  it  on  my 
■writing  table  in  the  drawing-room." 

"Thank  you;  that  is  all." 

There  was  no  cross-examination  of 
this  witness,  and  after  the  pause, 
the  counsel  for  the  defence  spoke 
again. 

"Superintendent  Figgis." 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      239 

"You  searched  the  house  of  Mrs. 
Assheton  in  Sussex  Square?" 

"Yes,  sir." 

"What  did  you  take  from  it?" 

"A  leaf  from  a  blotting-book,  sir." 

"Was  it  that  leaf  which  has  been 
already  produced  in  court,  bearing  the 
impress  of  a  letter  dated  June  21st?" 

"Yes,  sir." 

"Where  was  the  blotting-book?" 

"On  the  writing-table  in  the 
drawing-room,  sir." 

"You  did  not  examine  the  blotting- 
book  in  any  way?" 

"No,  sir." 

Counsel  opened  the  book  and  fitted 
the  torn  out  leaf  into  its  place. 

"We  have  here  the  impress  of  a 
letter  dated  June  21st,  written  in  a 
new  blotting-book  that  did  not  arrive 
at  Mrs.  Assheton 's  house  from  the 
shop  till  June  24th.  It  threatens  — 
threatens  a  man  who  was  murdered, 
supposedly  by  the  prisoner,  on  June 


240    THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

23d.  Yet  this  threatening  letter  was 
not  written  till  June  24th,  after  he 
had  killed  him." 

Quiet  and  unemotional  as  had  been 
the  address  for  the  Crown,  these  few 
remarks  were  even  quieter.  Then  the 
examination  continued. 

' '  You  searched  also  the  flat  occupied 
by  the  deceased,  and  you  found  there 
this  envelope,  supposedly  in  the  hand- 
writing of  the  prisoner,  which  has  been 
produced  by  the  prosecution?" 

"Yes,  sir." 

"This  is  it?" 

"Yes,  sir." 

"Thank  you.     That  is  all." 

Again  there  was  no  cross-exami- 
nation, and  the  superintendent  left 
the  witness  box. 

Then  the  counsel  for  the  defence 
took  up  two  blank  envelopes  in  addition 
to  the  one  already  produced  and  sup- 
posedly addressed  in  the  handwriting 
of  the  prisoner. 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      241 

"This  blue  envelope,"  he  said,  "is 
from  the  stationery  in  Mrs.  Assheton's 
house.  This  other  envelope,  white,  is 
from  the  flat  of  the  deceased.  It 
corresponds  in  every  way  with  the 
envelope  which  was  supposed  to  be 
addressed  in  the  prisoner's  hand,  found 
at  the  flat  in  question.  The  inference 
is  that  the  prisoner  blotted  the  letter 
dated  June  21st  on  a  blotting  pad 
which  did  not  arrive  in  Mrs.  Assheton's 
house  till  June  24th,  went  to  the 
deceased's  flat  and  put  it  an  envelope 
there. 

These  were  handed  to  the  jury  for 
examination. 

"Ernest  Smedley,"  said  counsel. 

Mills's  servant  stepped  into  the  box, 
and  was  sworn. 

"Between,  let  us  say  June  21st  and 
June  24th,  did  the  prisoner  call  at  Mr. 
Mills's  flat?" 

"Yes,  sir,  twice." 

"When?" 


242     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

"Once  on  the  evening  of  June  23d, 
and  once  very  early  next  morning." 

"Did  he  go  in?" 

"Yes,  sir,  he  came  in  on  both 
occasions." 

"What  for?" 

"To  satisfy  himself  that  Mr.  Mills 
had  not  come  back." 

"Did  he  write  anything?" 

"No,  sir." 

"How  do  you  know  that?" 

"  I  went  with  him  from  room  to  room, 
and  should  have  seen  if  he  had  done  so. " 

"Did  anybody  else  enter  the  flat 
during  those  days?" 

"Yes,  sir." 

"Who?" 

"Mr.  Taynton." 

The  whole  court  seemed  to  give  a 
great  sigh;  then  it  was  quiet  again. 
The  judge  put  down  the  pen  with 
w^hich  he  had  been  taking  notes,  and 
like  the  rest  of  the  persons  present 
he  only  listened. 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       243 

' '  When  did  Mr.  Taynton  come  into 
the  flat?" 

"About  mid -day  or  a  little  later  on 
Friday." 

"June  24th?" 

"Yes,  sir." 

"Please  tell  the  jury  what  he  did?" 

The  counsel  for  the  prosecution 
stood  up. 

"I  object  to  that  question,"  he  said. 

The  judge  nodded  at  him;  then 
looked  at  the  witness  again.  The 
examination  went  on. 

"You  need  not  answer  that  question. 
I  put  it  to  save  time,  merely.  Did  Mr. 
Taynton  go  into  the  deceased's  sitting- 
room?" 

"Yes,  sir." 

"Did  he  write  anything  there?" 

"Yes,  sir." 

"Was  he  alone  there?" 

"Yes,  sir." 

"Thank  you." 

Again  the  examining  counsel  paused, 


244    THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

and  again  no  question  was  asked  by 
the  prosecution. 

"Charles  Mart-in,"  said  the  counsel 
for  defence. 

"You  are  a  servant  of  the 
prisoner's?" 

"Yes,  sir." 

"You  were  in  his  service  during 
this  week  of  June,  of  which  Friday 
was  June  24th?" 

"Yes,  sir." 

"Describe  the  events  —  No.  Did 
the  prisoner  go  up  to  town,  or  else- 
where on  that  day,  driving  his  motor- 
car, but  leaving  you  in  Brighton?" 

"Yes,  sir." 

"Mrs.  Assheton  came  back  that 
morning?" 

"Yes,  sir." 

"Did  anyone  call  that  morning? 
If  so,  who." 

"Mr.  Taynton  called." 

"Did  he  go  to  the  drawing-room?" 

"Yes,  sir." 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       245 

"Did  he  write  anything  there?" 

"Yes,  sir;  he  wrote  a  note  to  Mrs. 
Assheton,  which  he  gave  me  when  he 
went  out." 

"You  were  not  in  the  drawing- 
room,  when  he  wrote  it?" 

"No,  sir." 

"Did  he  say  anything  to  you  when 
he  left  the  house?" 

"Yes,  sir," 

"What  did  he  say?" 

The  question  was  not  challenged  now. 

' '  He  told  me  to  say  that  he  had  left 
the  note  at  the  door." 

"But  he  had  not  done  so?" 

"No,  sir;  he  wrote  it  in  the  drawing- 
room. 

"Thank  you.     That  is  all." 

But  this  witness  was  not  allowed  to 
pass  as  the  others  had  done.  The 
counsel  for  the  prosecution  got  up. 

"You  told  Mrs.  Assheton  that  it 
had  been  left  at  the  door?" 

"Yes,  sir." 


246    THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

"You  knew  that  was  untrue?" 

"Yes,  sir." 

"For  what  reason  did  you  say  it, 
then?" 

Martin  hesitated;  he  looked  down, 
then  he  looked  up  again,  and  was  still 
silent. 

"Answer  the  question." 

His  eyes  met  those  of  the  prisoner, 
Morris  smiled  at  him,  and  nodded. 

"Mr.  Taynton  told  me  to  say  that," 
he  said,  "I  had  once  been  in  Mr. 
Taynton's  service.  He  dismissed  me. 
I " 

The  judge  interposed  looking  at  the 
cross-examining  counsel. 

"Do  you  press  your  question?" 
he  asked.  "I  do  not  forbid  you  to 
ask  it,  but  I  ask  you  whether  the  case 
for  the  prosecution  of  the  —  the  pris- 
oner is  furthered  by  your  insisting  on 
this  question.  We  have  all  heard,  the 
jury  and  I  alike,  what  the  last  three  or 
four  witnesses  have  said,  and  you  have 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       247 

allowed  that  —  quite  properly,  in  my 
opinion  —  to  go  unchallenged.  I  do 
not  myself  see  that  there  is  anything  to 
be  gained  by  the  prosecution  by  press- 
ing the  question.  I  ask  you  to  con- 
sider this  point.  If  you  think 
conscientiously,  that  the  evidence,  the 
trend  of  which  we  all  know  now,  is  to 
be  shaken,  you  are  right  to  do  your 
best  to  try  to  shake  it.  If  not,  I  wish 
you  to  consider  whether  you  should 
press  the  question.  What  the  result 
of  your  pressing  it  will  be,  I  have  no 
idea,  but  it  is  certainly  clear  to  us  all 
now,  that  there  was  a  threat  implied 
in  Mr.  Taynton's  words.  Personally  I 
do  not  wish  to  know  what  that  threat 
was,  nor  do  I  see  how  the  knowledge 
of  it  would  affect  your  case  in  my  eyes, 
or  in  the  eyes  of  the  jury." 
There  was  a  moment's  pause. 
"No,  my  lord,  I  do  not  press  it." 
Then  a  clear  young  voice  broke 
the  silence. 


248     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

"Thanks,  Martin,"  it  said. 

It  came  from  the  dock. 

The  judge  looked  across  to  the  dock 
for  a  moment,  with  a  sudden  irresistible 
impulse  of  kindliness  for  the  prisoner 
whom  he  was  judging. 

"Charles  Martin,"  he  said,  "you 
have  given  your  evidence,  and  speaking 
for  myself,  I  believe  it  to  be  entirely 
trustworthy.  I  wish  to  say  that 
your  character  is  perfectly  clear. 
No  aspersion  whatever  has  been  made 
on  it,  except  that  you  said  a  note  had 
been  delivered  at  the  door,  though  you 
knew  it  to  have  been  not  so  delivered. 
You  made  that  statement  through  fear 
of  a  certain  individual;  you  w^ere 
frightened  into  telling  a  lie.  No  one 
inquires  into  the  sources  of  your  fear. ' ' 

But  in  the  general  stillness,  there 
was  one  part  of  the  court  that  was  not 
still,  but  the  judge  made  no  command 
of  silence  there,  for  in  the  jury-box 
there  was  whispering  and  consultation. 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      249 

It  went  on  for  some  three  minutes. 
Then  the  foreman  of  the  jury  stood  up. 
"The  jury  have  heard  sufficient  of 
this  case,  my  lord,"  he  said,  "and  they 
are  agreed  on  their  verdict." 

For  a  mom.ent  the  buzzing  whispers 
went  about  the  court  again,  shrilUng 
high,  but  instantaneously  they  died 
down,  and  the  same  tense  silence 
prevailed.  But  from  the  back  of  the 
court  there  was  a  stir,  and  the  judge 
seeing  what  it  was  that  caused  it 
waited,  while  Mrs.  Assheton  moved 
from  her  place,  and  made  her  way  to 
the  front  of  the  dock  in  which  Morris 
sat.  She  had  been  in  the  witness- 
box  that  day,  and  everyone  knew  her, 
and  all  made  way  for  her,  moving  as 
the  blades  of  com  move  when  the  wind 
stirs  them,  for  her  right  was  recognised 
and  unquestioned.  But  the  dock  was 
high  above  her,  and  a  barrister  who  sat 
below  instantly  vacated  his  seat,  she 


250    THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

got  up  and  stood  on  it.  All  eyes  were 
fixed  on  her,  and  none  saw  that  at 
this  moment  a  telegram  was  handed 
to  the  judge  which  he  opened  and  read. 

Then  he  turned  to  the  foreman  of 
the  jury. 

"What  verdict,  do  you  find?"  he 
asked. 

"Not  guilty." 

Mrs.  Assheton  had  already  grasped 
Morris's  hands  in  hers,  and  just  as  the 
words  were  spoken  she  kissed  him. 

Then  a  shout  arose  which  bade  fair 
to  lift  the  roof  off,  and  neither  judge 
nor  ushers  of  the  court  made  any 
attempt  to  quiet  it,  and  if  it  was  only 
for  the  sensation  of  seeing  the  gallows 
march  nearer  the  prisoner  that  these 
folk  had  come  together,  yet  there  was 
no  mistaking  the  genuineness  of  their 
congratulations  now.  Morris's  whole 
behaviour  too,  had  been  so  gallant  and 
brave;  innocent  though  he  knew  him- 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK       251 

self  to  be,  yet  it  required  a  very  high 
courage  to  listen  to  the  damning 
accumulation  of  evidence  against  him. 
and  if  there  is  one  thing  that  the 
ordinary  man  appreciates  more  than 
sensation,  it  is  pluck.  Then,  but  not 
for  a  long  time,  the  uproar  subsided, 
and  the  silence  descended  again.  Then 
the  judge  spoke. 

"Mr.  Assheton,"  he  said,  "for  I  no 
longer  can  call  you  prisoner,  the  jury 
have  of  course  found  you  not  guilty 
of  the  terrible  crime  of  which  you  were 
accused,  and  I  need  not  say  that  I 
entirely  agree  with  their  verdict. 
Throughout  the  trial  you  have  had 
my  sympathy  and  my  admiration  for 
your  gallant  bearing."  Then  at  a 
sign  from  the  judge  his  mother  and 
he  were  let  out  by  the  private  door 
below  the  bench. 

After  they  had  gone  silence  was 
restored.  Everyone  knew  that  there 
must  be  more  to  come.    The  prisoner 


252     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

was  found  not  guilty;  the  murder  was 
still  unavenged. 

Then  once  more  the  judge  spoke. 

"  I  wish  to  make  public  recognition," 
he  said,  "of  the  fairness  and  ability 
with  which  the  case  was  conducted  on 
both  sides.  The  prosecution,  as  it 
was  their  duty  to  do,  forged  the  chain 
of  evidence  against  Mr.  Assheton  as 
strongly  as  they  were  able,  and  pieced 
together  incriminating  circumstances 
against  him  with  a  skill  that  at  first 
seemed  conclusive  of  his  guilt.  The 
first  thing  that  occured  to  make  a  weak 
link  in  their  chain  was  the  acknowledg- 
ment of  a  certain  witness  that  the 
stick  with  which  the  murder  was 
supposed  to  have  been  committed  was 
not  left  on  the  spot  by  the  accused, 
but  by  himself.  Why  he  admitted 
that  we  can  only  conjecture,  but  my 
conjecture  is  that  it  was  an  act  of 
repentance  and  contrition  on  his  part. 
When  it  came  to  that  point  he  could 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      253 

not  let  the  evidence  which  he  had 
himself  supplied  tell  against  him  on 
whom  it  was  clearly  his  object  to 
father  the  crime.  You  will  remember 
also  that  certain  circumstances  pointed 
to  robbery  being  the  motive  of  the 
crime.  That  I  think  was  the  first 
idea,  so  to  speak  of  the  real  criminal. 
Then,  we  must  suppose,  he  saw 
himself  safer,  if  he  forged  against 
another  certain  evidence  which  we  have 
heard." 

The  judge  paused  for  a  moment, 
and  then  went  on  with  evident  emotion. 

"This  case  will  never  be  reopened 
again,"  he  said,  "for  a  reason  that  I 
will  subsequently  tell  the  court;  we 
have  seen  the  last  of  this  tragedy, 
and  retribution  and  punishment  are 
in  the  hands  of  a  higher  and  supreme 
tribunal.  This  witness,  Mr.  Edward 
Taynton  —  has  been  for  years  a  friend 
of  mine,  and  the  sym^pathy  which  I 
felt  for  him  at  the  opening  of  the  case, 


254     THE  BLOTTING  BOOK 

when  a  young  man,  to  whom  I  still 
believe  him  to  have  been  attached, 
was  on  his  trial,  is  changed  to  a  deeper 
pity.  During  the  afternoon  you  have 
heard  certain  evidence,  from  which  you 
no  doubt  as  well  as  I  infer  that  the  fact 
of  this  murder  having  been  committed 
was  known  to  the  man  who  wrote  a 
letter  and  blotted  it  on  the  sheet 
which  has  been  before  the  court. 
That  man  also,  as  it  was  clear  to  us 
an  hour  ago,  directed  a  certain  envelope 
which  you  have  also  seen.  I  may 
add  that  Mr.  Taynton  had,  as  I  knew, 
an  extraordinary  knack  of  imitating 
handwritings;  I  have  seen  him  write 
a  signature  that  I  could  have  sworn 
was  mine.  But  he  has  used  that  gift 
for  tragic  purposes. 

I  have  just  received  a  telegram. 
He  left  this  court  before  the  luncheon 
interval,  and  went  to  his  house 
in  Brighton.  Arrived  there,  as  I 
have  just  learned,  he  poisoned  him- 


THE  BLOTTING  BOOK      255 

self.  And  may  God  have  mercy  on 
his  soul." 

Again  he  paused. 

"The  case  therefore  is  closed,"  he 
said,  "and  the  court  will  rise  for  the 
day.  You  will  please  go  out  in 
silence." 


THE  LIBRARY 
UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 

Santa  Barbara 


THIS  BOOK  IS  DUE  ON  THE  LAST  DATE 
STAMPED  BELOW. 


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AUG281985 

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A  A  001  423  300 


3   1205  00068  6244 


